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istor came and 



THE 



5^-5^/yP 



SOLDIER'S STORY 



(Saptivitg at |ittd^v^0ttv}lk, §^lk §^U, 



AND OTHER REBEL PRISONS. 



By warren lee GOSS, 

OF THE SECOND MASSACHUSETTS REGIMENT OF HEAVY AETILLEBT. 



|Uttstrat«ir bg i;ijomas '§mt 



BOSTON: 

1867. 






Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1866, by 

WARR EN LEE GOSS, 

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. 



JAN. 20, 1848 



STEREOTYPED AT THE 

BOSTON STEREOTYPE FOUND ET, 

No. 4 Spring Lane. 



If the cause for which so many sacrifices 
were made — which so many died in prison to 
perpetuate — was worth suffering for, are not 
the scenes through which they passed worthy of 
commemoration and remembrance in the hearts 
of their .fellow-countrymen ? Justice to the 
living who suffered, impartial history, and the 
martyred dead, demand a full, unexaggerated 
record by a survivor of these horrors. For this 
purpose this book, through agonizing memories, 
at last has been finished. With the author it 
has been rather a work of solemn duty than 
of pleasure. He simply states facts, and depicts 
those scenes of prison life best fitted to convey 
to the minds of general readers some of its 

(3) 



PREFACE. 



characteristic phases, just as prisoners saw it, — 
giving to history material for its verdict, and 
the reader a full understanding of the subject. 

In almost every household throughout the 
land there are saddened memories of these 
dreadful prisons; but as terrible as has been the 
past, thous.ands of the same patriotic men are 
ready to spring to arms again for the preserva- 
tion of national life and honor. On his crutch, 
the author makes his bow to the public, hoping 
that in The Soldier's Story they may find 
instruction and profit. 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. 

Enlistment in the Engineer Corps. — A Prophecy of Dining in Rich- 
mond fulfilled differently from Expectations. — Battle at Savage's 
Station. — Terrible Conflict. — The Army of the Potomac saved. 

— An Incident. — Heroism in a Wounded Soldier. — A Retreat. — 
Wounded taken Prisoners. — First Treatment as a Prisoner. — 
Rebel Prediction of the Capture of Washington. — Confidence in 
McClellan. — Stonewall Jackson. — False Promises. — Taken to 
Richmond. — A Sad Scene. — A Rebel Officer's Wit. — A Retort. 

— Search and Confiscation of Personal Efl'ects. — Description of 
Prison. — Life in Libby Prison. — Horrors of such Life. — Va- 
rious Incidents. — Change of Quai-ters. — Hope for the Better 
disappointed Page 17 

CHAPTER II. 

Belle Island. — Sickness and Insensibility. — Want of Medical 
Treatment. — Description of Belle Isle Prison. — Strict Regula- 
tions evaded. — Trading with the Rebels. — Insufficiency of Food. 

— High Prices of Commissary Stores. — Depreciated and Coun- 
terfeit Currency. — Comparative Virtue and Intelligence of Rebels 
of different States. — Extreme Suffering from Hunger. — Effects 
on the Character. — Philosophy on the Subject. — A Goose Ques- 



6 CONTENTS. 

tion. — Exchange on the Brain. — Increased Mortality. — A Gleam 
of Hope. — Exchange and Disappointment. — Escape and its Pun- 
ishment. — A Rebel Admission that Richmond might have been 
captured by McClellan. — More Prisoners and Suffering. — Ex- 
change. — Sight of the Old Flag 32 

CHAPTER III. 

Parole Camp. — Discharge. — Return Home. — Restoration to Health, 
— ReSnlistment. — Plymouth, N. C, Description of, and its De- 
fences. — A Skirmish with the Enemy. — Assault and Surrender 
of a Garrison. — Raid of the Rebel Ram Albemarle. — Capture 
of Plymouth and its Garrisons. — Again a Prisoner. — An Heroic 
Woman. — Disparity of Forces. — Large Rebel Loss. — An Ex- 
change of Hats. — Pretended Union Men become Rebels. — Negro 
Soldiers hunted and shot. — Similar Treatment by Rebels to North 
Carolina Soldiers. — Journey South. — The Women curious to see 
the " Yank" Prisoners. — " Dipping " by Women. — Unattractive 
Damsels. — Trading Disposition. — Depreciated Currency. — Tar- 
boro'. — Railroad Travel in crowded Cars. — False Hopes of 
Exchange. — Proposed Attempt to escape. — Delusions in Regard 
to Prison Life. — Wilmington. — Charleston. — Sympathy' of Irish 
and German Women. — EtTects of Shot and Shell. — Rebel Strat- 
egy. — Macon, Ga. — Arrival at Andersonville. — Acquaintance 
with Captain Wirz. — Impressions of the New Prison. . . 53 

CHAPTER IV. 

Prison-Life in Andersonville. — Twelve Thousand Prisoners. — A 
Shelter constructed. — Philosophizing in Misery. — Want of Fuel 
and Shelter. — Expedients for Tents. — The Ration System. — Con- 
tinued Decrease of Amount. — Modes of Cooking. — Amusement 
from Misery. — "Flankers," or Thieves. — New Companions. — 
A Queer Character. — Knowledge of Tunnelling acquired. — A 
novel Method of Escape. — Mode of Tunnelling. — The Dead 
Line. — Inhumanity and Brutality in shooting Prisoners. — Pre- 



CONTENTS. 7 

mium on such Acts. — Lack of Sanitary Regulations. — Sickness 
and Deatli very prevalent. — Loathsome Forms of Scurvy. — A nox- 
ious Swamp, and its Effects. — Untold Misery. — Large Accession 
of Prisoners. — Exposure to heavy Rains and hot Suns. — One 
Thousand Three Hundred and Eighty Deaths in one Week. — De- 
pression of Spirits, Insensibility, Insanity, and Idiocy. — Tendency 
to Stoicism. — More Pliilosophizing. — Human Sympathies a Cause 
of Sickness and Death. — Pliilosophy again. — Sad Cases of Death 
from Starvation 74 

CHAPTER V. 

Prison Vocabulary. — Punishment of Larcenies. — Scenes of Vio- 
lence. — Destitution provocative of Troubles. — Short Rations. 

— More Fights. — Advantages of Strength of Body and Mind. — 
New Standards of Merit. — Ingenuity profitable. — Development 
of Faculties. — New Trades and Ivinds of Business. — Cures for 
all Ills and Diseases. — Trading to get more Food. — Burden oi 
Bad Habits. — Experience in Trade. — Stock in Trade eaten up 
by Partner. — A Shrewd Dealer destroys the Business. — Trading 
Exchange. — Excitement in the Issue of Rations. — A Starving Man 
killed. — His Murderer let off easy through Bribery. — Consider- 
able Money in the Camp. — Tricks upon Rebel Traders in Prison. 

— Counterfeit or Altered Money disposed of. . . . . . . 101 

CHAPTER VI. 

Rations decreased, and worse in Quality. — Crowded Condition of 
the Prison. — Heavy Rains and Increased Sickness. — Much Filth ' 
and Misery. — Hunger a Demoralizer. — Plots exposed for Extra 
Rations. — Difficulties of Tunnelling. — A Breath of Outside Air ' 
and New Life. — An Escape under Pretext of getting Wood. — 
Captured by Bloodhounds after a Short Flight. — Something learned 
by the Adventure. — A Successful Escape believed to be possible. 

— Prcpai'ations for one. — Maps and Plans made. — A New Tun- 
nelling Operation from a Well. — The Tunnel a Success. — The 



8 CONTENTS. 

Outer Opening near a Rebel Camp Fire. — Escape of a Party of 
Twenty. — Division into Smaller Parties. — Plans of Travel. — 
Bloodhounds on the Path. — The Scent lost in the Water. — Va- 
rious Adventures. — Short of Provisions. — Killing of a Heifer. — 
Aided by a Negro. — Bloodhounds again. — Temporary Escape. — 
Fight with the Bloodhounds. — Recapture. — Attempted Strategy. 
— The Pay for catching Prisoners. — Reception by Wirz. — Im- 
provement by the Expedition. — Some of the Party never heard 
from. — Notoriety by the Flight 115 

CHAPTER VII. 

Increase of Prisoners, generally destitute. — Greater Suffering from 
no previous Preparation. — Sad Cases of Deaths. — Rations growing 
worse. — Bad Cooking and Mixtures of Food. — Almost untold 
Misery. — Dying amid Filth and Wretchedness. — Preparing Bod- 
ies for Burial. — Horrible and Disgusting Scenes. — Increased 
Mortality. — Rebel Surgeons alarmed for their own Safety. — San- 
itary Measures undertaken. — Soon abandoned. — Scanty Supply 
of Medicines. — Advantages of a Shower-bath. — Gathering up the 
Dead. — Strategy to get outside the Prison as Stretcher-bearers. — 
Betrayal by supposed Spies. — Horrors at tlie Prison Gate in the 
Distribution of Medicines. — The Sick and Dying crowded and 
trampled upon. — Hundreds died uncared for. — Brutality in car- 
rying away the Dead. — The same Carts used for the Dead Boches 
and in carrying Food to the Prison 136 

CHAPTER VIII. 

Robberies in Prison. — Means taken to punish such Acts. — A Char- 
acter. — Big Peter, a Canadian. — His Administration of Justice 
on Offenders. — Becomes a Ruling Power. — Missing Men and 
Rebel Vengeance. — Murders of Prisoners by Thieves. — A Police 
Force organized. — Courts established. — Trials of accused Mur- 
derers. — Conviction and Execution. — The Gang of Murderers, 
Thieves, and Bounty Jumpers broken up. — A Slight Tribute to 



CONTENTS. 9 

Wirz, as only the Tool of Others. — Character of the Prison 
Police. — Not all Good Effects. — A Terror to the Good as- well 
as Bad. — Sometimes the Instruments of Rebels 150 

CHAPTER IX. 

yegro Prisoners. — Barbarous Amputations. — None but the Wounded 
made Prisoners. — Their cleanly Habits. — Treatment. — Major 
Bogle. — Bad Treatment of him as an Officer of Negro Troops. — 
A Misunderstanding. — Andersonville a Prison for Privates, and 
not Officers. — A great Project to break from Prison. — Two Thou- 
sand engaged in it. — Tlie Project betrayed when nearly com- 
pleted. — Despondency at the Eesult. — Courage renewed pror- 
identially. — Addition to the Stockade. — Much short Comfort from 
the Enlargement. — A new Stock of Fuel soon exhausted. — Dis- 
honorable Offers to Prisoners generally spurned by starving Men. — 
Fidelity under extraordinary Circumstances. — Instances cited. — 
H-i-oic Men. — New Methods of Operation. — These also spurned. 

— Various Evidences of Devotion to Country 159 

CHAPTER X. 

Exchange on the Brain. — Rumors of Sherman's Movements. — Great 
Expectations and sad Results. — Fearful Mortality. — Hot Sun and 
powerful Rains. — Stockade swept away. — A Spring of pure 
Water. — A new Tunnelling Operation nearly fatal to its Projectors. 

— Rebel Aid for once welcomed. — Construction of rude Barracks. 

— Prospects of Winter in Prison not encouraging. — Weary, 
miserable Days. — Increased Sickness and Mortality. — Names of 
fifty deceased in the Writer's Company. — Contrast of Loyal Blacks 
with Disloyal Wliites. — Another Tunnelling Operation betrayed 
for Tobacco. — The Betrayer punished. — Believed to be a Spy. 

— Further Rumors of Exchange. — A Realization. — Great Joy. 

— Dying Comrade when Release was ordered. — An affecting 
Scene. — Delusive Hopes. — Departure from Andersonville. — 
Short Rations. — Doubtful Deliverance. — Charleston again. — A 



10 CONTENTS. 

Talk with a Rebel Citizen. — Effects of the Siege on the City. - 
Pity and Sympathy. — Shot and Shell a Civilizer. — The Fair 
Grounds 173 

CHAPTER XI. 

Imprisonment on the Fair Ground. — Improved Condition. — Hard- 
tack, and the Fear of losing it. — Tin Pail stolen. — Great Mis- 
fortune. — Loss of Caste by it. — Ivindness of Women. — Ludicrous 
Tumbling into Wells. — Gilmore's Morning Reports welcomed. — 
The Dead Line again. — Continued large Mortality. — Want of 
Hospital Accommodations. — Good Offices of Sisters of Charity. — 
The Issue of Rations. — More Variety, but not of Quantity. — Ex- 
pedients to obtain an Increase. — The Rebels baffled in Counting. 

— Honorable Conduct of Colonel Iverson. — Scarcity of Wood. — 
Sad Cases of Destitution. — Shocking Condition of the Writer. — 
Effects of Scurvy. — Death while waiting for Food. . — Decreased 
Rations. — Plans for Escape. — A Trial at it. — "Recaptured. — A 
warm Fire. — Sent to the Workhouse. — Improvement on the 
Camp. — Discovery of interesting Papers. — Sent back again to 
Prison. — A new Partnership. — Rations getting worse. — Further 
Attempts to bribe Prisoners to Disloyalty. — Starved and insane 
Men consent. — A Speech and its good Effects. — The picturesque 
Appearance of the Orator. — Yellow Fever. — Ludicrous Incidents. 

— Leave Charleston. — Journey to Florence. — Another Attempt to 
escape 189 

CHAPTER XII. 

Imprisonment at Florence. — An affecting Scene. — Inhumanity of 
Rebel Authorities. — The Stockade similar to that at Andorsonville. 

— Precautions against Tunnelling. — Disrespect of Rebels to their 
Chief. — Poor Shelter. — Afterwards improved. — Suffering from 
Cold. — Scanty Rations. — Woodcutters detailed. — Dreadful An- 
noyance by Vermin. — Police organized under Big Peter. — The 
Force perverted to bad Purposes. — Despondency at the Pros- 



CONTEXTS. 11 

pects. — Further Attempts to purchase Treason. — Despaii has its 
Effects. — An Apology for the poor Fellows. — Their Hope of Es- 
cape while in Rebel Service. — Some of them shot as Deserters. — 
Sublime Heroism. — Colonel Iverson again. — A Brutal Under- 
officer. — Good News. — The Arrival of Clotliing. — A scanty 
Supply. — The Hospital flanked for a good Meal. — The Clouds 
breaking. — More Food. — Statement of Colonel Iverson that Food 
was limited by Orders. — Interest in Presidential Election. — Vote 
by Prisoners. — Majority for Lincoln. 216 

CHAPTER XIII. 

Philosophy of Humor in Suffering. — Natural for Men to seek for 
Sunlight. — Smiles and Tears. — Lightness of Heart. — Jesse L. 
a Sample. — His comical Demeanor. — Jess as a Pair of Bellows. 
— A queer Remark. — Dealing out Rations. — All Eyes on the 
Meal-bag. — Squeezing the Haversack. — Eyes big with Hunger. — 
Jesse's Tactics. — Raising the black Flag. — More Truth than Po- 
etry. — Jack E. — Herbert Beckwith. — Jess cooking under Diffi- 
culties. — Scurvy. — Combination of Disease, &c. — Torturing 
Memories. — Character developed by Suffering. — Arthur H. 
Smith. — A Break. — Death of Comrades. — A Political Creed. — 
Escape by Bribery. — Coincidences. — Instances of them. — De- 
cember, 1864. — A Call for Clerks. — Colonel Iverson's Sur- 
prise 230 

- CHAPTER XIV. 

A New Life. — Plenty of Food. — Better Clothes and Treatment as 
a Clerk. — Register of Dead made up for our Government. — 
Large Mortality for the Number of Prisoners. — Many recorded 
" Unknown." — New Supplies of Clothing. — Colonel Iverson af- 
fected. — Fears from Better Diet. — Symptoms of Paralysis. — A 
large Arrival of Letters. — Longings for Home revived. — Rebel 
Adjutant Cheatham. — Georgia Troops. — Yankees employed on 
the Register, for Want of Competent Rebels. — General Winder. 



12 CONTENTS. 

— His Dislike of Favors to Prisoners. — Unfeeling Remarks by 
him. — All sent back to Prison but the Clerks. — Inhumanity to 
Prisoners under him attributed to the Rebel Government. — An 
attempted Palliation by Iverson that Rebel Prisoners were ill 
treated. — Low Estimate of Yankees by Iverson. — Humor of 
Adjutant Cheatham. — His Description of a South Carolina Drill. 

— New Prisoners. — Orders to prepare for Exchange. — A Joyful 
Day. — A Poor Comrade. — Sad Sights. — A little Strategy to get 
off. — A Surprise, and Imprisonment ended. — Left Florence for 
Charleston. — Awaiting the Subsiding of a Storm. — A Massachu- 
setts Rebel. — Compassionate "Woman. — Under the "Old Flag" 
again. — Arrival at Annapolis. — Once more at Home. . • 250 



INTRODUCTION. 



o>»=;c 



The world's ear is full of cries from the land of rebel 
barbarism, where starvation walked at the side of every 
captive, and suffering, despair, and death sat at every 
prison door. In these prisons thousands of patriotic 
hearts ceased to beat during the war that has recently 
closed. Torn with hunger and hapless despair, they 
sadly and mournfully died during the long and bitter 
imprisonments to which rebel cruelty subjected them. 
Thousands of hearts have bled at the mere recital of 
the horrors of Libby, Anderson ville, Florence, Dan- 
ville, and Salisbury. And far lands, looking across 
the ocean, have shuddered at the spectacle of rebel 
barbarity, developed before their eyes, wondering how 
in a Christian country such things could be. It is, 
perhaps, an old story now ; but, as no detailed account 
of any one of great experience has ever been presented 
to the public by the sufferer himself, the writer of this 
narrative proposes to tell what he has seen, and felt, 

(13) 



14 ENTEODUCTION. 

and known, of the slaveholders' mercy while yet the 
touch of their fierce cruelty is upon him. 

During the progress of the war, it has been my 
misfortune to have been twice a prisoner, once in 1862, 
and again in 1864, — the first period of captivity four 
months, the second nine months, — making in all over 
year of the most unparalleled misery which man e\'er 
survived. My experience in these prisons was of a 
kind which few endure and live. Mr. Kichardson, 
the correspondent, Avho has done so much to enlighten 
the public mind on this subject, by his own acknowledg- 
ment, a great part of his time enjoyed the comparative 
luxury of a hospital. Sergeant Kellogg, who has 
written a very true account of his imprisonment at An- 
dersonville, was a sergeant of a hundred men, and drew 
extra rations ; and a good portion of his time was 
also spent in hospitals of the prisons. Very hard fare 
was his, it is true, but a luxury to what the great mass 
of prisoners enjoyed. My imprisonment was without 
mitigation of this kind, except the last three weeks of 
my last confinement. 

I propose to relate the tale of horrors experienced in 
these prisons without exaggeration. All language which 
my poor pen can command is powerless to convey even 
a faint impression of what men suffered there. Very 
few went through those imprisonments without becom- 



INTRODUCTION. 15 

ing idiotic — mere wrecks of humanity, unfit to convey 
their impressions by reason of weakness of mind, and 
unwiUing, even if they had the power, because of the 
soul-harrowing, frightful memories which were thus re- 
called. Therefore it is that the most terrible sufferings 
have never been delineated, or even attempted. Though 
it may be presumption in me to attempt it, yet I will 
try to make the world acquainted with some of the 
details of prison life and experience. I know how 
hard it is to realize that men can live through some 
of the cruelties which I shall relate ; but " truth is 
stranger than fiction," and no truth is stranger than 
"man's inhumanity to man," as developed in rebel 
prisons. 



THE SOLDIER'S STORY. 



o^®io 



CHAPTER I. 

Enlistment in the Engineer Corps. — A Prophecy of Dining in Rich* 
mend fulfilled different from Expectations. — Battle at Savage's 
Station. — Ten-ible Conflict. — The Army of the Potomac saved. 

— An Incident. — Heroism in a Wounded Soldier. — A Eetreat. — 
Wounded taken Prisoners. — First Treatment as a Prisoner. — 
Rebel Prediction of the Capture of Washington. — Confidence in 
McClellan. — Stonewall Jackson. — False Promises. — Taken to 
Richmond. — A Sad Scene. — A Rebel Oflacer's Wit. — A Retort. 

— Search and Confiscation of Personal Effects. — Description of 
Prison. — Life in Libby Prison. — Horrors of such Life. — Va- 
rious Incidents. — Change of Quarters. — Hope for the Better 
disappointed. 

AT an early date in the war, I was a member of the 
United States engineer corps of the regular 
army, at that time consisting of one company, and 
two others partially formed, all under Captain Duane, 
for some time chief engineer of the army of the 
Potomac. I performed the usual duties of an engineer 
at Yorktown, at Williamsburg, and on the Chicka- 
hominy, until, being in the first stages of a fever, I 
was sent to Savage's Station, where I was taken pris- 
oner. About two weeks previous to my being captured, 

2 (17) 



18 THE soldier's STORY. 

I had written to my friends, that, in course of a week 
or more, I ex2)ected to dine in Richmond. Though it 
proved to be ?i prophecy, circumstances, in interpreting 
the language, seemed to have taken me more at my 
word than at my wish ; for it would have been more 
congenial mth the wishes of the prophet to have 
entered the "city of Ids hopes" in a very different 
style than that which fate ordained. 

On the 27th of June I arrived at Savage's Station, 
the sound of battle on every side telling how desperate 
was the nature of the contest. On the 28th and 29th, 
the Williamsburg road, which passed the camp near 
Savage's Station, was crowded with baggage wagons, 
ammunition, pontoon trains, and all the indescribable 
material of a vast army. The hospital camp at Savage's 
Station consisted of three hundred hospital tents and 
several negro shanties full of sick and wounded soldiers 
from the battle-fields. 

" There is an open plain of several hundred acres 
opposite Savage's Station. It was along this plain 
the Williamsburg road passes, by wliich our troops 
M^ere mainly to effect their retreat," or change of base. 
" Beyond the level plain was a dense pine forest." It 
was here, on the edge of the road, that, on the after- 
noon of the 29th, General Sumner was stationed with 
twenty thousand men, who were to hold in clieck the 
enemy until our troops had escaped beyond the White 
Oak Swamp. " Here these men awaited, in one dark 
mass, for hours, the approach of the trebly outnumber- 



BATTLE AT SAVAGE's STATION. 19 

ing foe, while regiments, divisions, and trains filed by 
them. The fate of the army was in their hands, and 
they proved worthy of the trust." 

About five o'clock in the afternoon, dense clouds of 
dust rising in the wood beyond heralded the approach 
of the enemy. " As they drew near, from their whole 
mass of artillery in front they opened a terrific fire, to 
which our guns responded," until tlu-ough the dense 
smoke was seen only the flash of artillery, like lightning 
from the tempest cloud. Sometimes the roar of the 
conflict would almost cease, but only to be renewed 
with more terrible visior. " For an hour not a musket 
was discharged, but the reverberating thunder of the 
cannon shook the hills ; then the whole majestic mass 
of rebels," with then' peculiar yell, in marked contrast 
with the three distinct cheers of oiu' men, " sprang 
forward upon the plain, presenting a crested billow of 
glittering bayonets, which, it would seem, no mortal 
power could withstand. Every musket in the Union 
lines was brought into deliberate aim. For a moment, 
there was a pause, until it was certain that every bullet 
would fulfil its mission, and then a flash, followed by a 
storm of lead, which covered the ground with dead and 
dying." The three distinct cheers of our men responded 
to the hyena-like yell of the rebels. Beaten back by 
tliis storm of lead, the rebel host wavered, broke, and 
retreated to the railroad. Troops coming up beliind 
pressed them forward again to om' lines. "Again there 
leaped from ten thousand guns the fiery blast, and yell 



20 THE soldier's STORY. 

answered yell ; for a moment a pause, to be suc- 
ceeded by the instantaneous discharge of ten thousand 
guns." And then, as if stung to frenzy, the rage of 
the conflict was redoubled — the clash of arms inter- 
rupted by the occasional arrival of reenforcements in 
the field on the rebel side, who, as they came up, 
cheered their companions with loud shouts. 

The battle raged incessantly until half past eight or 
.line o'clock, when cheer after cheer went up from our 
nen, to which was heard no answering rebel yell, telling 
that the army of the Potomac was saved. The rebels 
brought into the field fifty thousand men, and were 
beaten back by the gallant, devoted men under Sumner. 

During the action, and afterwards, I was rendering 
to the wounded such assistance as it was in my power 
to contribute. At one time, while aiding a young sur- 
geon (whose name I did not learn) who was ampu- 
tating a limb, as I turned aside to obtain water for 
his use, the surgeon and patient were both killed and 
terribly mutilated by the explosion of a shell. 

On the battle-field one sometimes hears sentiments 
from the rough soldier which would do credit to the 
most refined and chivalrous. At Savage's Station a 
young soldier belonging, I think, to the fifteenth 
Massachusetts regiment, was brought in wounded, had 
his wound dressed, and lay with closed eyes, apparently 
thinking. Presently he began to talk with me and 
others. "I have been thinking," said he, "how proud 
I shall be some day of these scars " (placing his hand 



A VICTORY. 21 

upon the dressing of the terrible sabre wound he had 
received across the face). "How proud mj mother 
will be of them ! " Suddenly the terrible discharge of 
artillery brought him to his feet. "Where is my rifle?" 
inquired he. " Surely," said one, " you will not go into 
the fight wounded as you are ! " He turned his large, 
intelligent eye upon the speaker, and, with an expres- 
sion on his face I never can forget, in those low, sup- 
pressed tones which men sometimes use when keeping 
down or repressing excitement, said, while he buckled 
on his war harness, "Look yonder 1 On the hill-side is 
the flag of my brigade, and I never could forgive 
myself if I neglected this chance to render service to 
my country." He went, and my heart went with liim. 
I saw him reach and mingle with his comrades in time 
to take part in the conflict. 

It was no wonder we were victorious, no wonder that 
the rebel hosts were di'iven back, and that there came 
no answering yell to the cheers of victory from the 
Union army ; for our army was made up of patriotic 
material — men who perilled life for their good govern- 
ment — the material to wring victory from defeat ! 
Hence, too, it was, that our army, though retreating 
and outnumbered, whipped the enemy in almost every 
battle during the seven days' fighting which terminated 
at Malvern Hill. After the battle of Savage's Station, 
says the Rev. Mr. Marks, " General Sumner called for 
reenforc(3ments to drive the enemy into the Chicka- 
hominy, thus showing how complete was our victory." 



22 THE soldier's story. 

When this conflict was over, Avorn and exhausted 
with sickness and my exertions, yet content in the con- 
viction that the victory was ours, I wrapped myself in 
my blanket and slept soundly, but awoke in the morn- 
ing to find myself a prisoner. Our force had retreated 
during the night, leaving the whole hospital camp at 
Savage's Station prisoners in the hands of the enemy. 
The first intimation was on finding a rebel guard around 
the camp. During the three or four days we remained 
here, the treatment experienced in the main was good, 
although no attention was given us, such as providing 
rations and medicines. Even our ice, of which there 
was a meagre quantity for the wounded, was taken by 
the rebel authorities, and sent to Richmond for the use 
of the Confederate sick and wounded. The enemy 
whom we came in contact with from the battle-fields, as 
a general thing, treated us kindly, or rather let us 
alone. 

As an instance of coolness manifested by our wounded 
at this time, I recollect one soldier desperately wounded 
in the leg, who had taken up his abode under a large tree 
near the station. He was as merry as a cricket, cracked 
jokes, whistled, and sang, and whittled like a veii- 
table Yankee, as he doubtless was. A Union surgeon 
gave him some ice one day to put on liis wound to pie- 
vent mortification, for the heat was intense. The poor 
fellow eyed the ice, and commenced eating it, and at last 
had eaten all except a small piece, when he began to 
look first at his leg and then at the ice, as if doubtful 



SENT TO RICHMOND. 23 

whether to finish eating the ice or to use it to cool his 
leg. He hesitated but a moment, and then said to him- 
self, " G — d, I guess I'll eat it all and let it ' strike out.' " 

Several correspondents of the Richmond press visited 
us at Savage's Station. " Our army," said one of them to 
me, casually, while taking notes, "will be in Washing- 
ton in a few days." I could not refrain from answering 
the boast, by saying, "Undoubtedly, but they will go 
there as I shall go to Richmond soon." And such was 
my confidence in McClellan at that time, that I fully 
believed him to be manoeuvring to bag the whole rebel 
army. The correspondent, after recommending me to 
keep a civil tongue in my head, turned sneeringly away. 

About the same time, a seedy-looking oflScer rode up, 
whom I accosted with the question of how we were to 
be sent into Richmond. "In ambulances," said he. 
"That," said a rebel guard, as the officer rode away, 
"is Jackson, our general." True enough, as I ascer- 
tained afterwards, it was Stonewall Jackson, who 
proved himself, in the few words of conversation I held 
with him, to be as big a liar as the rest of the rebels I 
had met ; for he must have known that the rebel 
army were greatly deficient in the article for the use of 
their wounded. 

On the 5th July, we were packed into filthy cattle 
cars, the sick and wounded crowded together, and sent 
into Richmond. About twenty of our wounded are 
said to have died dui'ing the passage of little over one 
hour. Arriving at the depot in Richmond, we were 



24 THE soldier's story. 

formed in order around the canal, preparatory to march- 
ing to prison. We were a hard-looking crowd, made 
greatly so through suffering. The heat of the day was 
such as to make the thinnest garment intolerable. Many 
cast away their shirts and coats, and others their panta- 
loons and shoes. "So many wounded and sick men in 
the streets of the rebel capital, pale, bleeding, and in 
some cases nearly naked, starting on their march for the 
prison" — an imprisonment which, with the great ma- 
jority, ended only with death — was calculated to excite 
pity in the hardest heart. 

Many were hopping on rude crutches ; others, with 
amputated arms and shattered shoulders, moved as far 
as possible from their staggering companions, and were 
constantly pressed back into the surging mass by the 
bayonets of the brutal guard. Several blind men were 
guided by the arms of the wounded, who leaned upon 
them for support. Others, confused and uncertain, 
groped and staggered every step like the palsied. 
"Here," says Kev. Mr. Marks, who was a witness of 
the scene, "one, wounded in the leg, had thrown away 
Ids torn and bloody pants, and was limping along with 
nothing but liis crimson bandages ; another, wounded in 
the chest and arm, had thrown off his blood-stiffened 
shirt, and, with the upper portion of the body bare, 
moved along in the crowd, leaning upon a less injured 
companion." 

Such was the crowd that left the depot and slowly 
moved around the canal. One would think such a 



CARY STREET PRISON. 25 

Spectacle was calculated to excite pity, but in this case 
it excited scoffs and derision. Even the children took 
the tone of their elders, and one little fellow, about six 
years of age, perched exultantly upon a gate, condensed 
in the single sentence of, "We've got you, you d — d 
Yankees you ! " a whole volume of rebel hate and 
triumph. If we did not then believe om-selves to be 
that description of a Yankee, we had occasion to change 
our opinion when we arrived at our destination. On 
our way an officer rode up to us, tinselled with gold lace 
in a most extraordinary manner, — doubtless some of- 
ficer of the home guard, — and sneermg, asked if that 
was "Falstaff's army of recruits ! " "No," replied one 
of the boys at my side, who understood the insult, " we 
are not ; but here they come ; " pointing to a detach- 
ment of dilapidated rebels coming around a corner 
with the shuffling, unmilitary gait which is peculiar to 
the Johnnies. The officer rode away without any more 
attempts at wit. 

In the mean time, the sidewalks were lined with 
citizens who came to see the " Yanks," as they would 
to the exhibition of some strange animal. A very few 
exhibited any pity. A few women — mostly Irish or 
German — gave us food at the risk of their lives. While 
we halted before the prison, on Gary Street, the shades 
of night had come over the city. Many of the sick and 
wounded had fallen upon the pavements and sidewalks 
from sheer exhaustion, i^fter remainino- two hours 
before prison No. 2, on Gary Street, we were ordered 



26 THE soldier's story. 

in, and there went through with the ceremony of being 
searched. Everything the chivalry took a fancy to 
wag confiscated as contraband. Not even my jackknife 
and comb escaped, and I found myself, after the search, 
destitute of every thing but my blanket and the clothes 
on my back. 

The prison was one of the large tobacco warehouses, 
thiee stories high ; the rooms were large, poorly 
ventilated, and disgustingly filthy. The dust and 
tobacco juice of years had gathered in hillocks and 
ridges over the floor. These apartments were inde- 
scribably foul. They had been filled with prisoners 
who had but just been removed to make room for us, 
and had left behind them all the offal of mortal mal- 
adies, weakness, and wounds. There had been no 
sweeping or cleaning, but into these rooms we were 
forced, compelled to drink in the suffocating air, the 
first breath of which caused one to shudder. 

The room in which I, with about two hundred of my 
companions, was placed, was too filthy for description. 
Here, for five days, almost suffocating from Avant of 
air, and crowded for room, I remained, having rations 
issued to me only twice during the five days, and those 
poor in quality, and insufficient in quantity for a sick 
man. So with all the sick and wounded. No medical 
attention was given, and the horror of our situation 
seemed more than could be borne. To such a degree 
were we crowded, that Ave were obliged to arrange our- 
selves in tiers, like pins on paper, when we slept 



LIBBY PRISON. 27 

at night. And even with this precaution we were 
crowded for sleeping-room. Constant interference of 
some one's feet with another's head or shins caused 
such continued wrangling as to make night and day- 
more like an abode of fiends than one of human beings. 

At last I was taken from this place, and sent to 
Libby Prison, which has often been described ; and yet 
from the description given, no adequate idea of the 
sufferings endured can be formed. The filth and heat 
were greater than even the place I had left. With 
some five hundred others I was crowded into the garret, 
next the roof, of the prison. The hot sun, beating 
down upon the roof, made the filthy garret, crowded 
with men clamorinof for standino;-room, suffocatino- in 
a degree which one cannot well understand who never 
experienced it. During the day, in the corners of our 
garret the dead remained among the living, and from 
these through all the rooms came the pestilent breath of 
a charnel-house. The vermin swarmed in every crack 
and crevice ; the floors had not been cleaned for years. 
To consign men to such quarters was like signing their 
death warrant. Two men were shot by the rebel guard 
while trying to get breath at the windows. 

The third day of my confinement in this abode of 
torture, I noticed a young soldier dying : his long, fair 
hair was matted in the indescribable liquid filth and 
dirt which clotted and ran over the floor of the prison. 
He was covered with vermin ; the flies had gathered on 
his wasted hands, on his face, and in the sunken 



28 THE soldier's story. 

sockets of his eyes. But even in this condition hunger 
had not left him. The scene seemed to fascinate me, 
and in spite of the rejiulsiveness of the picture, I con- 
tinued to look upon it, though it was, much against my 
will. I saw him try to get to his mouth a dirty piece 
of bread, which he held in his hand : the effort was in 
vain ; the hand fell nerveless by his side ; a convulsive 
shudder, and he was dead. After he had been dead half 
an hour, his hand still clasped over the poor dirty piece 
of bread, a Zouave who had one leg amputated, observ- 
ing the bread, dragged himself through the filth and 
dirt, and unclasj)ing the dead man's fingers, took the 
bread from the rigid hand, and ate it like a famished 
wolf. 

Men lay on the filthy floor unable to help themselves, 
gasping for breath, while their more healthy companions 
trod upon and stumbled over them. The common 
expression used was, " I shall die unless I get fresh 
air." Every breath they breathed was loaded with the 
poison of fever and the eflluvia of the dead. When 
rations were issued, two thirds of the very sick got 
nothing, for the manner of issuing was without order, 
and the distribution was by a general scramble among 
those who were the best able to wrangle for it. I was 
fortunate in getting rations the first day in Libby, but 
the second and third I got none. Meanwhile, my fever 
-grew worse and worse ; oppressed for breath, crowded 
for room, unable to get into the prison yard to perform 
the common functions of nature, to which was added 



LIBBY PRISON. 29 

the want of medicines and even common food, made 
my situation so horribly intolerable that I could only 
hope for relief in death. All this was made worse by 
the constant wrangling for room, for air, and food. I 
succeeded in obtaining some pieces of board, by which 
means I raised myself from the dirty floor and the 
liquid filth around me. 

I had been in Libby about a week, when an officer 
passed tlu'ough the rooms, announcing that those who 
were able to walk could be accommodated with quarters 
in a healthy location on Belle Island. None of us had 
heard of Belle Island as a prison at that time, and we were 
eager to better our condition. Worse it did not seem 
possible it could be, and we believed there would be 
some truth even with rebels in dealing with men in our 
situation. The chance of benefiting myself was irre- 
sistible, and so I managed to crawl and stumble down 
stairs into the streets. The breathinsr of fresh air once 
more was refreshing ; but, trying to get into line, I 
stumbled, and fell fixinting to the ground. I was 
carried by some kind people into an Irishwoman's 
shop, where I was treated to raspberry wine and baker's 
bread. She asked me if I thought our army would 
come into Kichmond. I answered her (believing it 
true) , that I thought our army would have Richmond 
in a week or two. " I hope they will," said she ; "for 
this is a devilish place, and I Avish I was in New York." 
I got into line after being persuaded by the bayonet of 
the guard, and, being too weak to stand, fell down on 



30 THE soldier's STORY. 

the pavement. A rebel guard, addressing me, said, "I 
guess you'd better not go down there, old boss ; Belle 
Isle's a right smart hard place, and I reclcon you won't 
any more'n live to get down thar any way." About the 
time we commenced our line of march for Belle Isle, it 
began to rain in torrents, drenching me through. I 
should never have reached the prison camp alive, had 
it not been for the kind assistance tendered me by the 
rebel soldier who had previously addressed me as " old 
boss." 

We arrived at one of the long bridges which cross 
the James River between Belle Isle and Richmond ; 
after which I have a confused recollection of falling, 
succeeded by a blank. I knew no more, vmtil I found 
myself lying on the damp ground, with no shelter from 
the driving rain, and hundreds of others around me in 
the same situation. I have only a confused recollection 
of what occurred for four or five days after my arrival, 
when I inquired where I was. I was addressed as 
"old crazy" by my companions, and told to keep still. 
I afterwards learned that I had been delirious most of 
the time for four or five days, during which I had 
received no medical attention or care except the cold- 
water cure of nature. This came in such copious 
quantities as to remind one of what is related of 
Charles Lamb, who, on being questioned concerning 
the cold-water cure, replied that he never knew where 
it had been tried on an extensive principle since the 
deluge, when he believed it killed more than it cured. 



LIBBY PRISON. 31 

It was three weeks before I got a shelter, though there 
were quite a number of tents on the Island ; and the 
shelter which I became possessed of consisted of an old 
striped bedtick ripped open, and set upon sticks, in 
poor imitation of an A tent. 



32 THE soldier's stoey. 



CHAPTER ir. 

Belle Island. — Sickness and Insensibility. — Want of Medical 
Treatment. — Description of Belle Isle Prison. — Strict Regula- 
tions evaded. — Trading with the Rebels. — Insufficiency of Food. 
— High Prices of Commissary Stores. — Depreciated and Coun- 
terfeit Cun'ency. — Comparative Virtue and Intelligence of Rebels 
of different States. — Extreme SutFering from Hunger. — Effects 
on the Character. — Philosophy on the Subject. — A Goose Ques- 
tion. — Exchange on the Brain. — Increased Mortality. — A Gleam 
of Hope. — Exchange and Disappointment. — Escape and its Pun- 
ishment. — A Rebel Admission that Richmond might have been 
captured by McClellan. — More Prisoners and Suffering. — Ex- 
change. — Sight of the Old Flag. 

BELLE ISLAKD is (situated on a bend of the James 
River, about half a mile west of Richmond. The 
river at this point is very swift of current, and full of 
fantastic groups of rocks and little islands, covered mth 
luxuriant foliage, among which the water dashes in 
sparkling foam. Three bridges span the river between 
the island and the city. The island contains some 
forty or fifty superficial acres, rises at the lower ex- 
tremity, towards Richmond, in a gentle, sandy plain, 
and upon this was situated the prison camp, consisting 
of about four acres of the lowest land on the James 
River — almost on a level with the river, and conse- 



BELLE ISLAND PRISON. 33 

quently unhealthy. Beyond tlie prison grounds to the 
westward the island rises into a precipitous blulF, there 
crowned by strong earthworks, which commanded the 
river above. The prison grounds were surrounded by 
a low board railing, around which guards were sta- 
tioned at intervals of fifteen paces. 

The guard regulations on the island were very strict. 
The rules established were, that there should be no con- 
versation between the prisoners and the guard, and that 
no prisoner was to come mthin three feet of the railing 
or fence which enclosed the prison. But, in spite of 
rules and regulations, the irresistible Yankee spirit of 
trade and dicker perverted even the virtuous grayback 
guardians of the prison. Trading over the line on the 
sly was one of the professions, and all became more or 
less expert at the business. As the guard had oixlers 
to shoot or bayonet any one infringing these rules, the 
business was sometimes risky, especially when a new 
guard was put on who knew not the ways of those who 
were before them, when some contrary Secesh was on 
duty who did not care to learn, or some confiding indi- 
vidual of the grayback species who had been cheated in 
a sharp trading speculation. 

The common way in opening negotiations for trade 
with a new or ugly guard was to hold up, at a safe dis- 
tance, some article of a tempting nature, — a jackknife, 
watch, or a pan- of boots, — making signs that they 
were to be purchased cheap, until the virtuous Secesh 
broke the ice by inquiring the price. A lookout being 
3 



34 THE soldier's story. 

established to give warning of the approach of the offi- 
cers of the guard, trade would commence, and spread 
from guard to guard, and sometimes beyond the guard 
all alono" the line. In this manner a whole guard 
would be seduced from virtue, and put to silence by 
the fascination of high-top Yankee boots and pinchbeck 
watches. The commodities of trade on the Yankee 
side were articles of clothing which could ill be ajfforded, 
bone rings of prison manufactui'e, watches, chains, and 
jackknives ; the last-named being temptations agauist 
which the most obdurate of Johnnies was not proof. 
Even a commissioned officer would condescend to 
chaffer and trade for a paii' of boots or a jackknife. 
In return, we were the recipients of hoe-cake, wood 
to cook with, apples, and sometimes potatoes and 
tobacco. Occasionally officers from Richmond came 
into the prison, and traded for clothing, and were not 
too honest sometimes to walk off without paying for 
their purchases. 

I had been steadily getting up from the fever which 
had prostrated me, the turning-point of wliich occun'ed 
during my first week's experience at "Belle Isle," when 
I gradually regained strength, though the food was so 
insufficient and poor as to reduce the inmates of the 
prison to an almost starving condition. I found by 
personal experience and observation that, when hungry, 
men will adopt very ungenteel habits to satisfy their 
cravings, such as picking up bones rejected by others, 
^nd gnawing them like dogs, struggling for stray 



BELLE ISLE PEISON FARE. 35 

potato peelings, in fact, anything of an eatable 
nature. 

I saw one day an Irish acquaintance who liacl pos- 
sessed hunself of a bacon bone mth some meat on it, 
but more maggots than meat. " What are you doing, 
Jim ? " I interrogated. " Quarrelling with the mag- 
gots," said Pat, with a comic leer, "to see who will 
have the bone." Whereupon he brushed the maggots 
oiF, contemptuously, and went in for a meal. 

Our rations at this time consisted of one half loaf to 
each man per day, and beans, cooked in water in which 
bacon had been boiled for the guard, — usually contain- 
ing about twenty per cent, of maggots, — owing to 
scarcity of salt ; thirty per cent, of beans, and the 
remainder in water. There may have been a very 
small percentage of salt, but the fact was not ascer- 
tainable by the sense of taste. Only through faith — 
which coidd give no great flavor to the palate — could 
one see its existence in the soup — for such was the 
name with which this compound was dignified. It was 
issued sometimes twice a week, and sometimes not at all. 
The bread was of a very good quality, but so spongy 
that our poor daily lialf loaf could be enclosed in the 
half shut hand. The insufficiency of food was aggra- 
•\ated by neglect of the prison authorities to issue 
regularly ; sometmies we got no rations from Saturday 
morning until Monday night. The excuse usually 
given was, that the bakers in the city were on a drunk, 
or that there were no blank requisitions, which excuses 



36 THE soldiee's story. 

didn't seem to fill our stomachs , and thongli thej had 
to be taken in place of rations, we fomid them a poor 
substitute. No " back rations " were ever issued. 

The buildings of the commissary department were 
just outside the prison limits, near the -water's edge, on 
the south side. Here non-commissioned officers of the 
prison, liaving charge of the issue of rations, were called 
out, when the bread -was counted out to them and 
brought in in blankets. The fact that these blankets 
were infested ■\vdth vermin did not detract from the 
tremendous cravings of appetite. At the commis- 
sary's, molasses, pies, and sugar were kept for sale 
at exorbitant rates — molasses, one dollar per pint, 
sugar, one dollar and fifty cents per pound, onions, 
twenty-five cents apiece, and every thing else pro- 
portionally liigh. Butter and milk could rarely be 
had at any price. Though not acknowledgmg any 
superiority, at that time, of tbc value of greenbacks 
over their shinplaster cun-ency, they much preferred 
the former, in payment, to then* own. It was quite 
noticeable that they showed a good deal of hesita- 
tion in taking their own scrip. Their fractional cur- 
rency consisted of bills issued by cities, towns, and 
privata individuals. Petersburg money, or the frac- 
tional currency of any other town, would not pass cur- 
rent. On the sly, even at that date, rebel officers would 
buy up greenbacks at the rate of three dollars for one. 
Fellows in our condition developed some talents, which 
under other circumstances, and among decent people, 



TEADE WITH THE REBELS. 37 

would have been considered dangerous. Two dollar 
greenbacks were altered into twenties, ones into tens, 
&c. Broken down banks of northern States were 
passed by us, and received with grasping eagerness, 
and even rebel shinplasters were changed into higher 
denominations than they were ever intended to repre- 
sent. Counterfeited brass was also worked up into 
heavy gold chains by ing*enious Yankees. In fact, 
eveiy means, however desperate, was resorted to, all 
for the purpose of obtaining food. Except in some 
very rare cases, we did not swindle the rebel guard, 
whicli would have been for our disadvantage. But 
woe to the unsuspecting citizen, who, in his greed of 
gain, seduced the virtuous (?) graybacks to enable him 
to trade over their post with the Yanks. 

As soon as I obtained sufficient strength to walk 
round, I entered into competition with others, and 
after trading away my shoes and coat for food, set up 
as a kind of commission merchant, for dealing in boots 
and any other article of clothing of ti-ading value. By 
this means, with perseverance I managed occasionally 
to obtain an extra johnny-cake, a potato, or an onion. 
I might have been seen at any time during the day 
passing slowly around the guard line, trying to strike 
up a trade for sometliing to eat. In passing thus around 
the camp, I had a chance to become acquainted with 
the disposition of the guard belonging to different 
States. I found the Alabama and Georgia men to be 
the most intelligent, while the rank and file belonging 



38 THE soldier's story. 

to Virginia regiments were the most ignorant and 
vindictive. A common question proposed to me was, 
" What do you'uns come down to fight we'uns for ? " 
It was of no use to state facts, however impartial, or to 
argue, for it would only bring a repetition of the same 
question. They seemed to be oblivious of the fact that 
the quarrel was commenced by themselves, and any 
instructions volunteered by a Yank would be argued 
by the angry thrust of the bayonet, which was too 
powerful an argument to be met ; consequently the 
Johnny considered himself a victor in all argument, 
since where he failed in reason, he parried with the less 
sentimental but more powerful argument of force, 
which has always seemed to me to be the distinctive 
method adopted by the two sections. It makes, in the 
end, however, but little difference, as they have been 
soundly beaten with their own favorite arguments of 
force, which they applied indiscriminately to the heads 
of our legislators before the war, and during its prog- 
ress to prisoners of war and non-combatants. 

During the last of July our sufferings were intense. 
All other thouo;hts and feelinsjs had become concen- 
trated in that of hunger. Even home was associated 
only with the various descriptions of good food. John 

H , a sergeant of the eighteenth Massachusetts, 

used to answer my questions of how he was, with the 
invariable expression, "Hungry as h — 11," which may 
have been correct, as far as torment of that description 
exists in the place mentioned. There were thi'ee stages 



msurnciENCY of food. 39 

of hunger in my experience ; first, the common hungry 
craving one experiences after missing his dinner and 
supper ; second, this passed away, and was succeeded 
by headache and a gnawing at the stomach ; then 
came weakness, trembling of the limbs, which, if not 
relieved by food, was followed by death. Ordinarily we 
received just enough- food to keep us hungry, which 
may seem a doubtful expression to the general reader ; 
but those who have been similarly circumstanced, who 
read this, will recognize it as a truth. Men became, 
under such surroundings, indiiFerent to almost every- 
thing, except their own miseries, and found an excuse 
in their sufferings for any violations of the ordinary 
usages of humanity. An incident occurred illustrative 
of this which came to my notice while I was trading 
around the camp. 

Near the dead line, on the west side of the camp, 
were one or two wild-cherry trees, which formed the 
only shade in the prison limits, and these not much, as, 
from time to time, their branches had been cut off for 
fuel, in spite of the vigilance of the guard, and the 
necessity of shade for the prisoners. Here, one after- 
noon, I found a German dying. No one was there to 
care for him and soothe his dying moments ; the parched, 
filthy ground was his death-bed ; over his wasted hands 
and sunken face the flies were gathering, while the 
disgusting sores of his flesh swarmed with maggots 
and other vermin. Moved by such a spectacle, I sat 
down by his side to brush the flies from his pallid face, 



40 THE soldier's STORY: 

and moisten the parched lips with water from my canteen. 
Quite a number thereupon gathered around. One, 
professing sympathy with so pitiable an object, sug- 
gested that he would feel better to have his boots oiF, 
and forthwith pulling them off, coolly walked away 
with them, and sold them. I afterwards met and 
recognized him, and expressed very freely my opinion 
tliat he had been guilty of a detestable act, unworthy of 
anything human. He confessed that it was rather 
rough, but excused himself by saying he was hungry, 
and thought it not so bad to steal from a dying man as 
from one likely to live ; and he thought the boots would 
do him more good than a dead man. There was some 
show of reason in this, and so much effrontery that I 
made no reply. 

Different minds are no doubt affected in a different 
degree by prison life, which in its best phase is simply 
inhuman, unnatural. But whatever the mental con- 
stitution, it must be influenced to a certain degree by 
terrible sufferings, and deflected, as it were, from its 
habitual angle. It is the calm, phlegmatic man of 
philosopliical balance, who is best calculated to endure, 
to look at the best side of every misfortune, and who 
brings to his aid the reflection that every moment is 
complete in itself, and adopts for his motto in all his 
sufferinirs " Sufficient unto the moment is the evil there- 
of." One who is naturally ill-tempered, under the 
aggravations of imprisonment becomes an insupportable 
monster. But if bad qualities are so forcibly developed 



A RAID ON GEESE. 41 

in some, the good also in others expands in the same 
ratio. The generous carry liberality into improvi- 
dence, while the charitable become self-sacrificing in 
their bounty. Suffering develops real character ; dis- 
guise throws off its mask under bodily and mental 
anguish, unreservedly, and indeed unawares, and shows 
the true character. Suffering is the crucible of human 
metal, and pure indeed must be the gold which is not 
tarnished or turned to dross by the heat of unmitigated 
afflictions. Under the tortures of imprisonment, that 
goodness must indeed be real which never forgets itself, 
but stands firmly upon its pedestal to the last. 

I was mixed up in some "right smart taU grass," as 
the expression goes among the " rebs," on account of 
the stealing of a Secesh goose. As the circumstances 
are illustrative of the risks men were willing to run in 
order to obtain food, although trivial I will relate them. 
A squad of geese belonging to the Secesh officers were 
often on parade just outside of prison limits, headed by 
a gander who seemed to take some pride in the dis- 
cipline and organization of his fellows — their drill and 
marching being fully equal, if not superior to that of 
their owners — the Secesh. The mouths of the pris- 
oners often watered at the bare thought of a boiled 
goose. One evening, about sundown, while the atten- 
tion of the sentinel was occupied with trade, the unsus- 
pecting geese were enticed under the guard railing with 
corn, a dash was made, and a goose and gander were 
captured. Their necks were wrung in a hurry. The 



42 THE soldier's story. 

cackling was drowned by some unusual noise furnished 
for the purpose, and altho.ugh the guard mistrusted 
" something was up," they did not find out the secret 
untn next morning, when it was ascertained and partic- 
ularly noticed that " goosy, goosy gander, no more 
did wander," and Avas missed from his accustomed 
haunts. Meanwhile, the goose had been eaten, with- 
out salt or sauce, and relished immensely. I was 
suspected of being concerned ; . but although many 
inquiries and threats were made, the inquirers were no 
wiser nor sounder on the " goose question " than before. 
Our conscience did not trouble us, for had it not been 
written, "Rebel property shall be confiscated." 

The 1st of August developed a fearful epidemic in 
prison, known as Exchange on the Bi*ain. The symp- 
toms among those infected were, they were continually 
rushing around camp, with the very latest news about 
exchange, to the great neglect of their personal cleanli- 
ness, and their skirmishing duties (a term usually 
applied to the act of hunting for vermin, a partial hunt 
being termed driving in the pickets) . The victims of 
this epidemic were willing to bet on being exchanged 
" to-morrow ; " their hopes were raised high during the 
day, followed by a corresponding depression, on the 
morrow, at being disappointed. With an anxious, 
haggard look, inquiring of every one who would listen, 
"What about exchange?" and, thus inquiring, Avould 
before noon obtain information (?) which would raise 
their expectations to a high pitch, to be followed by 



EXCHANGE ON THE BRAEST. 43 

despondency and discouragement, and sometimes death. 
The best philosophy was neither to believe nor doubt, 
but to wait patiently and hope much in a general 
manner, without setting the heart upon any particular 
time for its fulfilment. 

The contemplation of misery teaches the necessity of 
hope; cut off from comforts and tender sympathies, 
from the daily intercourse with friends, from the habit- 
ual avocations of life, — shut out from social pleasures, 
doomed to mental and physical sufferings, to the leth- 
argy of the heart, — he is lost, indeed, who loses hope. 
But while preserving hope, we should not build expecta- 
tions on frail foundations and in disappointments • lose 
it. While some of the prisoners endeavored by all 
sorts of ingenious stratagems to divert their minds from 
ennui and the monotony and misery of captivity, others 
gave up to sorrow, and pined away in the midst of 
morbid reflections and dismal forebodino;s. Some 
would lie for hours reading and re-readiug old letters, 
which had perhaps been their companions in peril ; and 
now, as they re-peruse them, were brought back slumber- 
ing recollections of home. In the species of existence 
which the prisoner leads, the memories of the past, the 
kindly sympathies expressed in tender messages of the 
dear ones far away in the sphere of real life, the affec- 
tionate tokens which he carries with him warm from 
the heart of unforgotten friends, — all these seem but 
the echoes of familiar voices borne from another world. 
They discourse to him pleasantly of departed joys, and 



44 THE soldier's story. 

past happy hours. There is a piteous consolation in it, 
like the mournful solace of the remembrance of friends 
who plant a dear grave Avith flowers. 

Prisoners gather together in groups, as evening comes 
on, to talk of home, and while away the tedium of the 
hour by recalling the pleasure which once was theirs ; 
the pleasures of the table were uppermost in their 
thoughts ; the eager attention given when some favorite 
dish was described in its minutest details, attested the 
interest taken in everything eatable. Upon lying 
down at night, the talk was of what we had eaten in 
times past, and what we would have when we could get 
it. -Suffering as we were from hunger, the sum total 
of all joy seemed to be condensed in the one act of 
eating. Some of the prisoners employed their moments 
in making finger rings of bone, handkerchief slides, 
napkin rings, watch seals, &c., many of which were 
very fine, and were bought up by the,' Sesesh ' guard to 
be sent home as specimens of " Yankee fixings, "as they 
termed them. 

Our fare daily grew worse, and new prisoners 
coming in, the prison was crowded in such a manner 
that it seemed impossible to get around. Deaths 
increased in prison to such a degree that a load of 
bread for the living was usually accompanied by a load 
of coflfins for the dead. The cofiins were of rough 
pine boards, the only decent thing provided for the 
prisoners. Rumors of exchange, which flooded the 
camp, were listened to only by a credulous few, the 



A GLEAM OF HOPE. 45 

thoughts of the majority being cast in that rigid mould 
of philosophy which teaches us not so much to fly 
from the evils that beset us, as to grapple with them 
and trample them under foot — a system of ethics 
which, however admirable, it is not easy to follow. 

Suddenly a gleam of hope burst upon the wretched 
camp of prisoners, and the horizon of prison life is 
made bright by the certainty of exchange. Officers 
cOttne into the prison and made the announcement, and 
we all were excited with the joyful prospect of ex- 
change. On this occasion of exchange, the rebels 
prided themselves on the performance of what they 
termed a " Yankee trick," in order to get all the men who 
were not sick separated from those who were not able 
to travel, and by this means they saved themselves much 
trouble. All the men who could not march seven miles 
were ordered to pass outside of prison bounds with their 
blankets and canteens, haversacks, and such rations as 
they might have on hand, intimating that such were to 
be sent by some mode of conveyance to City Point to 
be exchanged. There was a general rush to go out 
with those who were thus designated. Many good stout 
men, who might easily have marched twice the distance 
required, desirous of getting home, scrambled for a 
place among cripples and invalids. After lying all 
night, waiting with the highest expectations, we awoke 
in the morning to find that those who remained in camp 
had been marched out for exchange ; and we were sent 
back, after being kept in a broiling sun a large portion 



40 THE soldier's STORY. 

of the day. In common with the rest, I was disheart- 
ened, and men wept like children at this bitter disap- 
pointment. I had not, however, the reflection of re- 
gret, wliich many had, who conld have marched the 
required distance. 

About half the camp had been exchanged, which in 
one respect was beneficial to those remaining. We had 
more room and better quarters. Though our accommo- 
dations were better, and for the first time during my 
imprisonment I had the pleasure of living under a 
tent, the food became daily worse, less in quantity, and 
poorer in quality. To make our wretchedness greater, 
the rations intended for us were sold at the commissary's ; 
and in this manner, for a time, about a third of the 
men each day were cheated out of their food. The law 
would not allow the Confederate commissary to take 
greenbacks ; so he employed Yankee prisoners to sell 
for him, and they became engaged in the transactions 
of cheating and stealing from their more miserable 
companions. Such men were generally despised by 
their comrades for the crouching, cringing subservi- 
ency with which they identified themselves with the 
rebels, upholding and subscribing to their sentiments. 

The nights and mornings now became cold, and men 
who had disposed of their clothes during the warm- 
est weather, sadly felt the need of them. SuflTering 
from cold nights and during rainy weather, was severe, 
and told terribly On the health of those who, unfortu- 
nately, had given way to hunger, and sold their clothing 



CRUELTIES PRACTISED 47 

for food. It is hard, however, to determine whether 
they would have suffered more to have been deprived 
of the food thus obtained or from the deprivation of 
garments. Death was ahnost certain to him who got 
no food except that furnished by the prison authorities. 

Thus affairs became so desperate that, though sur- 
rounded by a vigilant guard, and on three sides with 
water, men were continually trying to make their escape. 
An Irishman, trying to escape, swam the river, evaded 
the bullets by diving and good fortune, and reached 
unhurt the opposite shore. There he was caught and 
brought into the guard quarters near the prison, and a 
double guard was established for his safe keeping. To 
punish him for his attempt at escape, he was "bucked," 
when he let loose such a piece of his mind, and such a 
rating with the unruly member, telling his tormentors 
more truth than they cared to hear, that they gagged 
him to keep him still. Thus they kept him in a burning 
sun, until he bled at the mouth and fainted. As soon 
as he recovered, the gag being removed, nothing 
daunted, he again gave them a " bit of his mind." They 
tried to make him clean their rusty guns, but he would 
not ; and they resorted again to the torture. What 
finally became of him I do not know ; but I heard the 
rumor, of which I have but a little doubt, that he died 
during the night from cruelty experienced at the hands 
of his relentless enemies. 

On the 1st of September, the guard, which had 
consisted chiefly of Alabama and Georgia regiments, 



48 THE soldier's story. 

were sent away, and were relieved by citizens from 
Richmond, many of them boys not over 'thirteen years 
of age, who could hardly carry a musket. One of these 
citizen soldiers one day ran a bayonet through a New 
York boy, from the effects of which he died in a few 
hours. A soldier of the Hawkins Zouaves sprang at the 
guard, and, reaching over the railing, seized him by the 
throat, lifted him from the ground, shook him until the 
"rebel brave" was black in the face, then hui'led him 
from him like a dog. The officer of the guard, coming 
up at the time, was saluted with a brick, which knocked 
him down. When inquiries were instituted, no infor- 
mation was to be got inside the prison. No one knew 
who threw the brick, or choked the guard ! I ever found 
our foreign soldiers in prison among the most inveter- 
ate haters of rebels, and unyielding as iron. During 
the last of August and first of September, no less than 
eight men were killed by the rebel guard. 

Captain Montgomery at that time was in command 
of the rebel post at Belle Island. In conversation with 
him one day, he remarked that, after the battle of Fair 
Oaks, our forces might have taken Richmond ; that 
there was a panic among their troops, through appre- 
hension of our following up the advantage gained dur- 
ing the last day's fight ; and that the James River 
bridges had been got ready to be destroyed by fire. 
He seemed very inquisitive about public sentiment at 
the North, and as to how long the North would fight. 

Some two thousand prisoners were added to our 



ESrCEEASE OF PRISONEKS. 49 

number from Salisbury during September. They had 
been much better fed than ourselves, and were much 
dirtier, having been deprived of the advantages of 
water, which we had from the river, and from little 
shallow wells from five to eight feet deep, which we 
dug all over the prison grounds. Several officers ac- 
companied them, among whom was Colonel Corcoran, 
►wdio, with other commissioned officers, was sent over to 
Richmond. After this arrival of prisoners, we were 
again crowded for room ; and the hopes of another ex- 
change had almost died out, when our camp was flooded 
with rumors of release by parole. Day after day passed. 
Hunger-stricken and pinched with cold, these walking 
spectres wandered around camp, gathering in groups to 
talk of home and exchange. 

About this time I got a Richmond paper, which ar- 
gued that dirty people required less food than people 
who were clean, instancing the Yankee prisoners of 
Belle Isle as an illustration of the truth of the assump- 
tion. Another paragraph announced that prisoners at 
Belle Isle would be exchanged on the coming Tuesday. 
Tuesday came, but no parole or exchange ! We waited 
])atiently, in hopes that something might turn up to re- 
lieve us ; but no relief came. It was so hard to wait, 
even a few days, for relief from our condition, that the 
uncertainty to which everything in rebeldom seemed 
condemned was excruciating mental torment, added to 
the physical misery endured. This jumbling together 
of so much of hopeless mortality, this endless crash of 
4 



50 THE soldier's STORY. 

matter and ceaseless shock of tortured humanity, is a 
curse to the mind. Some were on the ''tip-toe" of ex- 
pectation ; others, in their gloomy despondency, were 
resigned to the desperate idea of making a winter of it 
in ihis dreadful place, when a bow of promise appeared 
upon the dark background of adversity .that over- 
shadowed the prison, and a bright day of deliverance 
dawned upon us. 

The dark night of misery passed away, and I was 
called out to write in paroling the prisoners. With 
eager, trembling hand, I wrote first my own parole, 
and then worked all night. There were some funny 
descriptions accompanying the paroles — for instance, 
red hair, blue eyes, and dark complexion. Before 
morning the blanks of liberty were made out, and as 
morning dawned, we all hurried out of prison, — a 
motley crowd, ragged, dirty, and famine-stricken. 

The sick took fresh courage, and under Freedom's 
inspiration the lame walked, and rejoiced that their 
term of captivity was ended ; that once again they were 
to be under the protecting folds of Liberty's starry ban- 
ner. Again we entered Richmond ; and, as we passed 
through its streets, skeletons in form, from which almost 
all semblance of humanity had fled under the torture 
of imprisonment, we excited pity among even the vir- 
ulent women of the capital. They filled our canteens 
with water, and their kind faces showed that they were 
not dead to all pity. This revulsion of feeling in our 
favor since first passing through the rebel capital, was 



THE OLI> FLAG AGAIN. 51 

caused, perhaps, by their own sufFerings — the loss of 
some father or brother. Be it as it may, I knoAv that 
while the expressions of hate were few, the kindly 
expressions were many in our behalf. Perhaps militaiy 
restrictions were removed, which before had checked 
expression, and the rebel authorities were willing we 
should have some kindly remembrances upon our de- 
parture from such scenes. The shops of the city had 
mostly been closed, and one of the guard told me that 
every house in Kichmond was either a prison or a hos- 
pital. Though this may have been exaggeration, it 
was no doubt a fact that all the dwellings of Richmond 
had their spare rooms occupied by Confederate sick and 
wounded. In this city the infantry guards were relieved, 
and a cavalry escort furnished, who showed their confi- 
dence in our desire to reach our lines by letting us 
stragorle as we had a mind to. 

During the day we marched without food, and 
finally, late in the afternoon, a feeble cheer went up 
from the advance, which told that the old flag on our 
transports was in sight. Need I say how wildly our 
hearts beat at sight of that dear old flag which we had 
followed in battle, and which had floated among the 
peaceful scenes of home ! The feeling was too deep 
to be expressed in words or cheers. Tears of joy 
started to eyes unused to weep at misery ; the voice 
that attempted expression was lost in choking sobs. 
Men sat quietly down, tears coursing their dirt-fur- 
rowed cheeks, contented to look up and see the "old 



52 THE soldier's story. 

flag " floating over them. I sat in this manner, having, 
without knowing it, a quiet, joyful cry, when a com- 
rade came along, inquiring, " What are you blubbering 
about, old fellow?" I looked up, and saw he hadn't 
much to brag about, and replied, that I was crying 
because folks were such fools as to live imder a flag 
with three stripes, when they might have one with 
thu'teen over them. 

We hoisted anchor, left those scenes, and came, at 
last, a sick, maimed, emaciated company, to Annapolis. 
There kind hands cared for us, kind welcomes cheered 
us, and we knew we were at home at last — at home with 
the arms of a great nation around us, with the great 
love of noble loyal hearts. When I left Belle Island 
I had no hair or hat on my head, and my clothing con- 
sisted only of a pau' of pantaloons and a shirt. Neither 
hat, shoes, or jacket had I. 



PLYMOUTH, NORTH CAROLINA. 53 



CHAPTER III. 

Parole Camp. — Discharge. — Return Home. — Restoration to Healtli. 
— Reenlistment. — Plymouth, N. C. — Description of, and its De- 
fences. — A Skirmish with the Enemy. — Assault and Surrender 
of a Garrison. — Raid of the Rebel Ram Albemarle. — Capture 
of Plymouth and its Garrisons. — Again a Prisoner. — A Heroic 
"Woman. — Disparity of Forces. — Large Rebel Loss. — An Ex- 
change of Hats. — Pretended Union Men become Rebels. — Negro 
Soldiers hunted and shot. — Similar Treatment by Rebels to North 
Carohna Soldiers. — Journey South. — The Women curious to see 
the " Yank" Prisoners. — " Dipping " by Women. — Unattractive 
Damsels. — Trading Disposition. — Depreciated Currency. — Tar- 
boro'. — Railroad Travel in crowded Cars. — False Hopes of 
Exchange. — Proposed Attempt to escape. — Delusions in Regard 
to Prison Life. — Wilmington. — Charleston. — Sympathy of Irish 
and German Women. — Efiects of Shot and Shell. — Rebel Strat- 
egy. — Macon, Ga. — Arrival at Andersonville. — Acquaintance 
with Captain Wirz. — Impressions of the New Prison. 

THREE months followed in the parole camp, where 
I regained strength ; and the hardships through 
which I had passed seemed rather a distorted dream 
than a dreadful reality. Does the mind lose the sharp 
impressions of hardships, that it is inclined to look 
upon the pleasures i-ather than upon the dangers and 
disagreeable incidents of the past ? I will not tire the 
reader with details of incidents which in a few months 
ended in my discharge for disability, resulting from 
injuries received in the line of duty. 



54 THE soldier's story. 

Once more I returned to my home, where its com- 
forts and kind friends contributed to my restoration to 
health. Possessed naturally of a strong constitution, I 
recovered with almost marvellous quickness from disa- 
bilities w4iich an able board of medical men had pro- 
nounced incurable. With returning health came the 
desire to be again with my companions in the field. 
The clash of arms, the excitement of battle, the hurried 
military parades and displays, awoke all the pleasurable 
recollections, and there are many in the soldier's life. 
Hardships suiFered were remembered only to revive my 
hatred of the enemy who had caused them. 

I secretly longed again to be in arms, and finally 
joined company H, second Massachusetts heavy artil- 
lery, upon its original formation at Readville. It is not 
my purpose to give the common experiences of the field, 
and therefore I omit the months that followed. 

April, 1864, found at Plymouth, N. C, two com- 
panies, H and G, of the second Massachusetts heavy ar- 
tillery, garrisoning the forts and redoubts on the hostile 
borders of a rebellious State. Plymouth is situated on 
the Roanoke River, at the head of the Albemarle Sound. 
This post was commanded by Brigadier-General Wes- 
Bels, whose brigade consisted, besides the two comjjanies 
mentioned, of the following regiments : sixteenth Con- 
necticut, one hundred and first Pennsylvania, eighty-fifth 
New York, a New York independent battery, twenty 
men of the twelfth New York cavalry, a few negro 
recruits, and two companies of loyal North Caro- 



PLYMOUTH, NORTH CAEOLENA. 55 

linians. Upon our arrival (which was in February, 
1864), we found the phice in what a wag of our com- 
pany termed a dilapidated condition. It was the mere 
remnant of what had once Ijeen quite a thriving village. 
The rebel forces and our own had had each a turn at 
attempting to burn it, and thus the best buUt portion 
of the town had been consumed. At the time men- 
tioned, the town consisted of a few tumble-down 
houses that had escaped the flames, two or three brick 
stores and houses, and the rest a medley of negro 
shanties, made of staves split from pitch-pine logs, in 
which the surrounding country abounded, and a num- 
ber of rude frame buildings, made for government use, 
from material sawed at the steam mill which govern- 
ment possessed by confiscation. 

The place was a general rendezvous for fugitive 
negroes, who came into our lines by famiHes, while 
escaping from conscription or persecution, and for rebel 
deserters, who had become lean, hungry, ragged, and 
dissatisfied with fighting against the Union. Schools 
had been established for the young and middle-aged 
colored population, under the able tuition of Mrs. and 
Miss Fi'eeman, of Milford, Mass. The whole place 
had a Kip Van Winkle look, as though it had composed 
itself into a long sleep to awake after the era of revolu- 
tion and rebellion had passed. The forts protecting 
this place were five in number. Extending along a 
line of two miles were Fort Williams, covering the 
centre of the town. Battery Worth, commanding the 



56 THE soldier's stoey. 

river above, Compiler and Coneby redoubts, com 
manding the approaches of the left ; while ou the 
right, standing out half a mile, unconnected with those 
described, was Fort Wessels. Still farther to the right 
was Fort Gray, standing alone, one mile and a half up 
the river, on what is known as " War Neck," having no 
communication with the works described except by a 
foot-bridge consisting of single logs laid across a swamp, 
or by a boat on the river. A little tug-boat, called the 
Dolly, was continually plying between Fort Gray and 
the town. A line of rifle-pits connected Fort Wil- 
liams, Coneby and Compiler redoubts, with Battery 
Worth. 

On the morning of April 17, 1864, the consolidated 
morning report to the adjutant-general gave eighteen 
hundred men armed and equipped for duty. These 
men were to guard and defend a line of nearly three 
miles, where the difficulty of communication, and con- 
sequent concentration of men at the point of attack, 
was very great. The theory that a long line is a weak 
line was here exemplified. One strong bastioned work, 
with a good water battery connected by parallels, with 
strong abatis work, would, with the same number of men, 
have made the place much stronger, if not impregnable. 
On the afternoon of the 17th, while on my way to Fort 
Wessels, I met two drummer boys belonging to Fort 
Grf y on their way to the commanding general, with the 
information that the rebels were approaching in strong 
force witliin two miles of Fort Gray. This alarm sent 



ASSAULT ON PLYMOUTH. 57 

me- back to Fort Williams, where I arrived just as the 
enemy opened fire from the edge of the surrounding 
woods. That evening a battery opened on Fort Gray, 
followed by two charges of the rebel infantry, in which 
the rebels were repulsed with heavy losses. Thereafter, 
at that point of our line, they contented them-ielves by 
skirmishing, and an occasional shot from their artillery. 

On the afternoon of the 18th, our pickets, after dis- 
puting every step of the way, were driven in, and the 
rebel artillery, from their whole line in front, opened fire 
upon Fort Williams and the town. We returned the 
fire. The gunboats Miami and Smithfield did terrible 
execution. The battle was raging fiercely, when, in 
obedience to orders, I passed down through the town to 
the river. The shot and shell shrieked through the 
town, crushing through the walls and roofs of the 
houses and shanties. On the side of the houses towards 
the river were amusing groups of negro men, women, 
and children, who had gathered in the rear of their frail 
shanties, as if vainly hoping they might prove a protec- 
tion against the iron messengers of death. They made 
a preposterous noise, in which were mingled religious 
exclamations, prayer and supplication, with shrieks and 
lamentations. 

I passed safely through the town, and getting up 
steam on board the "Dolly," was fortunate enough to 
get her, with rations, to Fort Gray, much in want of 
supplies. A rebel battery, commanding the river, had 
made it difficult and dangerous to make the attempt. 



58 THE soldier's story. 

1 was fortunate in escaping the attention of the rebel 
battery, and arrived with the dead from Fort Gray. 
That night Sergeant Evans and myself buried the 
dead we had brought down. The rebels had been 
repulsed all along the line, with the exception of Fort 
Wessels, which, with a garrison of eighty men, had 
twice repulsed the rebels, and had taken thirty prison- 
ers, but at last had surrendered to overwhelming num- 
bers, not, however, until a rebel battery had been 
planted less than a hundred yards from them. 

After the fight I visited my old quarters, but found 
them knocked to pieces by shell and shot. I extricated 
from the ruins two blankets, in which I rolled myself, 
to sleep. This was about two o'clock in the morning. 
In about an hour I was aroused by hearing a heavy 
firing in the direction of Fort Gray. Rumors came 
that a rebel ram was coming down the river. Without 
firing a shot, — throwing from her smoke-stack huge 
volumes of pitch-pine smoke, — she passed within a 
few rods of Battery Worth, commanded by Lieutenant 
Hoppin, who was ordered, some five minutes before she 
hove in sight, to fire on the first tiling coming down the 
river, as it would be the rebel ram. At this battery 
was mounted a rifled gun, carrying a chilled end shot, 
weighing two hundred pounds, — enough, one would 
think, to blow the ram into the swamp on the opposite 
side of the river. Yet not a shot was fired from this gun 
until after she had passed below her, and sunk the Smith- 
field, whose crew were killed, captured, or drowned, 



A PRISONER AGAIN. 5 'J 

while the Miami ran away. Captain Fkisher, com- 
manding the gunboats, had hished the Miami and the 
Smithfield together with heavy chains, hoping in this 
way to detain the ram and sink her. While endeavoring 
to throw a shell down the smoke-stack of the ram he was 
killed. 

From the time the rebel ram passed our batteries, 
the loss of Plymouth was a foregone conclusion. 
During the night the rebels had thrown a pontoon 
bridge across the river on our left, and early the same 
morning they carried, by assault, our redoubts on this 
flank, which gave them the town in our rear, and soon 
had sharpshooters in every house, picking off our 
gunners. Such was our situation on the morning of 
the 20th. There was no fighting at Fort Gray ; Fort 
Williams alone returned a feeble fire upon the artillery 
planted upon all sides of them. The outworks soon 
surrendered, and Fort Williams sustained the conflict 
alone. Though summoned to surrender, and threatened 
with "no quarters " if we did not comply, we fought them 
single-handed until afternoon, when again being sum- 
moned, and our situation such that it was useless to 
contend longer against overwhelming numbers, the 
commanding General reluctantly surrendered, and I was 
again a prisoner of war. 

It is a pleasure to know that most of the men and 
officers of the second behaved with gallantry, as also did 
the other regiments in the field. The conduct of one 
woman here deserves to be mentioned, — Margaret 



60 THE soldier's STORY. 

Leonard, — the wife of a private of Company H, second 
Massachusetts heavy artillery. During the battle, she 
was engaged making coffee for the men in a building 
exposed to a heavy fire. At one time a solid shot 
passed through the building, taking with it one of her 
dresses, which hung on a nail by the wall Another 
carried away the front legs of her cooking-stove. Yet 
when the fight was over, on the evening of the 19th, 
she had coffee for the men, and supper for the officers. 
She was in Fort Williams during the remainder of the 
fight, and subsequently went through with a long and 
severe imprisonment at Andersonville, Macon, and 
Castle Thunder, Kichmond. 

During the fight, we had armed and equipped for 
action eighteen hundred men. The rebels acknowl- 
edged, in the Petersburg papers of the 27th, the loss of 
seventeen hundred men, in killed and wounded, before 
the defences of Plymouth ; thus paying very dear for 
their bargain, on their own showing. When we sur- 
rendered, our ammunition was gone, and our rations 
nearly exhausted. In the face of these facts, and with 
a full knowledge of them, a rebel captain boasted that 
had the Confederates possessed the forts, the whole 
Yankee nation couldn't have taken them. He probably 
had forgotten Vicksburg and Port Hudson. The forces 
at Plymouth surrendered only to overwhelming numbers. 

We were marched out between two lines of rebel 
infantry. As we passed along, the Secesh did us the 
honor to swap hats with us, by taking them from our 



SHOOTmG or negeo prisoners. 61 

heads and substituting their own in their place. I lost 
my tall dress hat, which had caught the eye of a reb, 
on account of the ostrich plume which embelKshed it. 
I would have preferred keeping it, as it had two very 
ornamental bullet holes in the top, made by some com- 
plimentary rebel sharpshooters during the action. Here 
let me record the fact, that many of the pretended Union 
men and women of the town were suddenly developed 
into exultant Secesh, and shouted their defiance as we 
passed through the place after our capture, — the same 
who, a few days before, were glad to draw government 
rations, and accept of like favors. 

We were marched into the open field in front of 
Plymouth, where we were strongly guarded for the 
night. Here, also, had been driven from the town, 
like so many cattle, the whole population of Plymouth, 
except those known as Secesh. Little children at the 
breast, — white, yellow, and black, — old women and 
young, were all huddled together in an open field, 
preparatory to — they knew not what. There were 
about twenty negro soldiers at Plymouth, who fled to 
the swamps when the capture of the place became cer- 
tain ; these soldiers were hunted down and killed, while 
those who surrendered in good faith were drawn up 
in line, and shot down also like dogs. Every negro 
found with United States equipments, or uniforms, Avas 
(we were told by the rebel guard) shot without mercy. 

The Buifaloes, as the North Carolina companies were 
called, escaped in some cases by swimming the river 



62 THE soldier's story. 

before the final siirrender. On those who were not 
thus fortunate, fell all the concentrated rage and hatred 
of the rebels. Many of these Buffaloes had assumed 
tlie garb and name of our dead artillerists, and in this 
manner, in some instances, escaped detection and death. 
On our way from Plymouth to Tarboro' I saw several 
of our North Carolina men selected out as deserters, 
and, without even the ceremony of a drum-head Coiirt- 
martial, strung up to the limb of trees by the road- 
side. We were closely guarded, but riot, as a general 
thing, badly treated. 

On the afternoon of the 21st we were rationed with 
our captured "hard-tack" and pork, formed into line, 
and sadly turning our faces from Pl^mnouth, where we 
had left our unburied dead, were marched into the in- 
terior. On the first day we marched about fifteen 
miles, and on the next, without any issue of rations, 
to Hamilton, where we were turned into a grove while 
our captors awaited orders respecting our destination. 
At Hamilton the citizen Secesh of the surrounding 

o 

country flocked to see the captured Yankees. They 
were mostly women, who were curious specimens of the 
feminine gender, — straight-skirted, without crinoline, 
and invariably addressing us as "you'uns Yanks." 
One of the unvarying inquiries among the women was, 
" lias you'uns Yanks got any snuff"? " It was rumored 
that we were to be exchanged for "Hoke's Bri'jad'^." 
This rumor was doubtless for the piu"pose of keepuig us 
(juiet and cheerfid, in order that we might be easy to 
raanaffe. 



SOUTHERN WOMEN. 63 

On the 24tli we left Hamilton for Tarboro', which 
place we reached about noon, and where we received 
rations of raw meal, beans, and bacon. During the 
day I traded my overcoat for a two-quart tin pail, 
which my previous prison experience told me would be 
as useful as anything I could possess. It came in early 
demand, for that night we cooked mug^.. Many wry 
faces were made at this fare, without salt ; yet, for 
many weeks and months after, we were glad when we 
got enough even of that. Here, also, the people from 
the town and surrounding country flocked to see the 
captured Yanks, bringing mth them articles to trade, 
the women more anxious for snuff than even at Ham- 
ilton. Some of them were quite well dressed ; but the 
majority were uncrinoUned, and had a withered look 
of premature age, noticeable among the middle-aged 
and young women at the South ; induced, I have no 
doubt, by the disgusting habit so prevalent there of 
"dipping," as it is called. This is performed by dip- 
ping the chewed end of a stick in snuif, and rubbing 
it among their teeth and gums. This habit may be 
accounted for from the fact that they have no useful 
pursuits to occupy their minds. 

Most of the men taken at Plymouth were well-dressed 
and good-looking, and I overheard one of the young rebel 
ladies (?) say that she thought some of the Yanks were 
real "pootey," and enthusiastically declared she would 
like to have one to keep. Whether she meant to have 
one as a plaything and pet, or to keep as negroes are 



64 THE soldier's story. 

kept, I know not. But the keeping, I think, by powei 
of attraction, would have been difficult, so destitute of 
charms of person and conversation were most of the Se- 
cesh damsels there congreoated. One of the sixteenth 
Connecticut regiment, having a brass chain in imitation 
of gold dollars linked together, traded it off as genuine, 
realizing a hatful of Confederate scnp. The women 
traded with us for biscuits of hoe-cake and corn, at 
exorbitant prices, all anxious to get greenbacks in re- 
turn, and generally seeming to shun their own currency, 
especially the bills of their beloved Confederacy. They 
were -willing to converse, if they were allowed to do 
all the talking ; but were very indignant at some of 
our boys, who persisted in calling their would-be nation 
the Corn-fed-racy. All this dicker and talk and chaff 
was carried on over the guard line. I traded off my 
boots for shoes at this place, and got ten dollars " to 
boot" in greenbacks, — all the money I had during an 
imprisonment of ten months. Silver brought a big 
premium. The common expression in exchange was, 
"ten cents in silver, or ten dollars in Confederate 
scrip ; " and at that rate the silver was eagerly seized 
upon. 

We marched through the streets of Tarboro', which 
were thronged with boys, negroes, old men, and ill- 
dressed women and cliildren. Some of the youngsters 
wore rejected Confederate forage caps, of C. S. A. 
make, much too big for them ; yet they seemed to con- 
sider them a military covering, which, on that occasion, 



TRAVEL SOUTH. 65 

did them honor. Passing the post-office, one of our men 
asked, jokingly, for a letter. The savage reply was, 
that they had nothing but bullets for Yankees. Arriv- 
ing at the depot, we were crammed into filthy box-cars, 
while heavy guards were stationed on top and at the 
entrance of the cars. Thus packed, sixty and seventy 
to a car, we started, at a slow rate, forward to our desti- 
nation, the engine throwing out dense volumes of pitch- 
pine smoke, making our journey rather uncomfortable. 
At noon we halted, to cook by the wayside, and again 
my little pail came into requisition ; for, after using it 
myself, it was lent to several other parties, who cooked 
their mush in it. A great many were without cooking 
utensils ; and having drawn nothing but raw rations, 
were forced to go hungry, borrow, or eat their Indian 
meal raw. Hunger will soon reduce one even to that 
expedient, in order to satisfy its demands. 

We observed, while oif the train, at different pointa 
along the route, that the track Avas much worn, occa- 
sionally replaced by rails of English manufacture. The 
guard, doubtless acting under instructions, kept alive 
the hopes of speedy exchange by relating fictitious con- 
versations, which they pretended to have overheard 
among the officers. This was well calculated to deceive 
the majority, but it did not deceive me. I was on 
the lookout for a convenient chance to escape, and was 
soon favored with what appeared to be an " opening." 
There was a hole in the side of the car in wliich I was 
located, through which a man might possibly squeeze ; 
5 



66 THE soldier's stoey. 

and a companion and myself determined, if we could 
get possession of the place occupied by two of our com- 
pany, to try and escape during the night, wliiie the 
train was in motion, by jumping from the car. With 
this idea we communicated our intentions to them, 
thinking they would be generous enough to afford an 
opportunity for our escape, if they did not wish to 
escape themselves. But upon our making them confi- 
dants of our intentions, they raised an outcry against 
us, and threatened to inform the guards if we did not 
desist. "We shall be shot by the guards if you es- 
cape," said they. One of these men repented of his 
folly after arriving in prison, and bitterly lamented that 
he had not then availed himself of the chances of thnt 
night. The general impression among our men at that 
time was, if they kept quiet, and did not trouble the 
rebels, their treatment, when we arrived in prison, would 
be much improved. Although I informed them of the 
manner in which prisoners were treated, they could not 
be brought to believe it was so bad after all. 

So liable are men to deceive themselves with false 
hopes and expectations, that when the rebel guard 
informed them that their destination was Anderson- 
ville, a beautifully laid out camp, with luxuriant shade 
trees filled with birds, and a running stream, in which 
fish sported, they swallowed the whole story un- 
doubtingly. So great was their confidence, that the 
rebels might safely have dispensed with a guard for a 
majority of the prisoners. Yet the vigilance of the 



CURIOSITY OF THE PEOPLE. 67 

guard was increased instead of relaxed, as we neared our 
destination, so that escape became impossible. 

All along the route, at every stopping place, men, 
women, and children flocked to see us as to a show. 
Even in the night, the " Southern heart " was encour- 
aged by a sight of the captured Yankees. Tliey came 
with "pitch-pine torches" to catch glimpses of the detest- 
ed Yanks. One talkative boy at a station one evening 
seemed very curious to see the Yanks, whom he had 
been informed had horns ; but we told him we had 
"hauled in our horns " considerably since our capture, 
which accounted for their not beins: visible. The little 
fellow said they used no lights in that part of the coun- 
try, except pitch-pine ; they were rather smoky, he 
acknowledged, but they would put up with that willing- 
ly, "rather than not lick the Yankees." We had some 
talk with an intelligent Lieutenant at the same place, 
who acknowledged the worthlessness of their money, 
but said they were going to fight it out upon the 
resources of the country. The Confederacy, he said, 
had a year's provisions on hand, and would fight as long 
as their means lasted. " Well, then," said I, " you 
might as well give up your cause, for M'lien your 
resources fail you are conquered, while the resources 
of the North are, if anything, more plentiful than 
before the war. Every man you bring into the field is 
taken from the producing powers of the country." At 
that instant the officer of the guard came up, and forbid 
further conversation with the "Yanks." Of course all 



68 THE soldier's story. 

conversations were carried on by us from the cars, 
where we were caged. 

On our arrival at Wilmington, we were halted at the 
depot, and again were rationed with bacon and hard- 
tack, three of the latter to a man. During our half 
hour's stop at this place we set fire to a high stack of 
cotton bales near us, which slowly burned, but did not 
attract attention of our guard at the time. Feeling bound 
to do all the injury we could in an enemy's country, 
we were much gratified to learn, when we arrived at 
Charleston, South Carolina, that " a large amount of 
cotton had been destroyed, supposed to have been fired 
by malicious Yankee prisoners, who passed through 
the place en route for Andersonville." We crossed the 
river at Wilmington, on board of a ferry-boat, halted at 
Florence, South Carolina, the next day, and received 
rations of Indian meal. That night we arrived in 
Charleston, and were locked up in the work-house 
yard. Next morning received rations of three hard- 
tack per man, and a slice of bacon. 

During the day we remained in the yard, bartering 
and trading with all who came to see us. I gave a 
man three dollars to get me some drawing paper. He 
returned, after a few hours, with two pages of an old 
ledger, one side of which had been written upon. I 
was rather angry at such a return, when he said, "You 
needn't flare up, old fellow, 'tis the best we'uns have." 
I subsequently was informed that it was the best I 
could have got had I gone for it myself. I wTote a 



PASSING THROUGH CHARLESTON. 69 

letter, and put on it a Confederate postage stamp, to 
mail it for home. I was promised it should be sent, but 
it never was received. We got bread at this place for 
one dollar per loaf, United States greenbacks, but the 
desire to speculate on our necessities raised it to three 
dollars per loaf before we left the jail yard. The day- 
was passed in talking and joking with such as came and 
felt disposed to talk with the Yanks. 

In the afternoon we were taken out of prison and 
passed through the streets of Charleston, which we saw 
for the first time by daylight. Women and children 
crowded the streets, and showed us much sympathy in 
various ways, by acts as well as words, the women fur- 
nishing the prisoners with tobacco, cigars, and food, for 
which they would accept no recompense whatever ; 
these, however, were mostly Irish or German. But 
through the whole of Charleston not a disrespectful or 
unkind word was uttered in our hearing. Sympathy 
with the Union cause, or possibly the constant firing 
down the harbor, had a beneficial eifect upon the inhab- 
itants, and in their conduct towards us. We halted on 
our march through the town at a German cigar manu- 
factory, where a fine-looking, keen-eyed young Ger- 
man presented us with cigars and food, and a very 
pretty young lady made a present of a bouquet to a good 
looking young fellow of our number. Having some 
paper with me, while seated on the pavement waiting 
for orders I drew several hasty sketches, and presented 
them to the people, thus leaving my card. Knowing 



70 THE soldier's STORY. 

a few words of German, I made known my wish to 
escape. Quite a pleasant conversation was carried on 
between the prisoners and the occupants of the side- 
walks and houses. 

On our way to the depot, we were taken through a 
part of the town where the shell and shot of our guns 
had done comparatively little injury, yet on every side 
was evidence of the terrific eflTects of our guns. At one 
place was a building destitute of a corner ; another h:id 
a round hole punctured through the brick walls, where 
the shot and shell had travelled. I guessed at the object 
in thus taking us through that part of the town which 
had suffered least, as having reference to our proba- 
ble exchange at no very distant day. They wished us 
to get a favorable opinion of the damage done to the 
town by our shot and shell from the islands and 
marshes. We were so kindly treated at Charleston 
that we left the city with regret, and were again packed 
on board of box-cars, preparatory to leaving for Ander- 
sonville. The captain, commanding our guard while in 
the city, was the son of the Irish patriot (?) Mitchel. 
Before the cars started, an old German woman came 
around inquiring for me ; and I have no doubt I missed 
a good chance of escape in being forbidden by the 
fifuard to talk with citizens. 

The next day we arrived at INIacon, Georgia, where 
we halted for a time. Macon had quite a prim. New 
England look, unlike any southern village I had before 
seen. It reminded me of Augusta, Maine. 



AJSIDERSONVILLE. 71 

The weather was rainy, drizzly, and suffocating 
on the hist of our journey, and a gloom pervaded 
our thoughts and feelings. During the whole day, 
through anxiety, as we ncared our destination, scarcely 
a word was spoken. We arrived at Andersonville about 
four o'clock P. M. , May 1 , 1864. It was raining severely 
when the train reached the place. Even then we did 
not imagine to what kind of quarters we were to be 
consigned. The guard answered our interrogations as 
to where we were going to put up, by ironically point- 
ing out some comfortable looking barracks as our hab- 
itations. 

Suddenly the whole scene changed ! A ferocious, 
round-shouldered little man, mounted upon a bay mare, 
surrounded by the guard who were to take the place 
of those who had accompanied us on the cars, came 
raving, swearing, and tearing round in a most extrava- 
gant manner. So ridiculous appeared to us his ges- 
tures, person, and looks, that we burst into a roar of 
laughter ; whereupon he turned upon us, bristling with 
rage, exclaiming, "By Got! you tam Yankees; you 
won't laugh ven you gets into the pull pen." It was a 
gratuitous prophecy, afterwards understood in all its 
hoiTors ; and the threats of Captain Wirz had too 
much significance in them to be laughed at. The 
recollection, even now, of the light manner we received 
so gross a monster, causes a shudder when I think what 
action our laugh might have prompted him to. I was 
selected out, on account of my sergeant's uniform, 



72 THE soldier's stoey. 

when, asking me if I could write, I was fm-nished with 
paper, and told to take the names, regiment, and com- 
pany of my car load of companions. When it was 
done, the names of some thirty more were given me, 
making in all ninety men, which was called "Detach- 
ment 21-30." The other prisoners were similarly di- 
vided, and placed under non-commissioned officers. 

The new guard belonging to the station relieved the 
old one, and we were marched a short distance, where 
a curious-looking structure, fifteen feet high, loomed 
up before us. Sentries were stationed on the top 
of little platforms, scaffolded up near and at the 
height of the enclosure. This was the " Stockndc," 
which was to become our future quarters. It was com- 
posed of the trunks of pine trees, which were set ver- 
tically into a trench, so close as to touch together, form- 
insr a close fence. In this manner about fifteen acres 
were fenced in. As we halted before the headquar- 
ters of the prison, waiting, like so many drowning rats, 
crouching in the rain, the guard, in answer to our ques- 
tions as to what kind of a place it was inside the 
stockade, replied, we would find out when we got in 
there. They said prisoners tried to escape sometimes, 
but the dogs always caught them. Never, to their 
knowledge, had a man escaped, except one, and he was 
drowned while trying to swim a pond to get clear of the 
doo-s. This was a crusher to the idea I had formed that 
the stockade might prove a good place for an escape. 

As we waited, the great gates of the prison swung 



DESPONDENCY AND GLOOM. 73 

on their ponderous oaken hinges, and we were ushered 
into what seemed to us Hades itself. Strange, skeleton 
men, in tattered, faded blue, — and not much of blue 
either, so obscured with dirt were their habiliments, — 
gathered and crowded around us ; their faces were so 
begrimed with pitch-pine smoke and dirt, that for a 
while we could not discern whether they were negroes 
or white men. They gathered and crowded around us 
to ask the news, and inquire from Avhence we came ; 
and in return we received the information that they had 
mostly come from Belle Island, whence they were sent 
the 1st of March. The air of the prison seemed putrid ; 
offal and filth covered the ground ; and the hearts, 
buoyed with expectation of good quarters, sank Avithin 
them when they knew that no shelter Avas furnished 
beyond what could be constructed of blankets or gar- 
ments. All my former experience of prison life had 
not prepared me for such unmitigated misery as met me 
everywhere. Our poor felloAvs, avIio had so confidingly 
believed in the humanity of rebels, were noAv depressed 
by despondency and gloomy forebodings, destined to be 
more than fulfilled. Of those of our company who that 
day entered these prison gates, not one third passed be- 
yond them again, except to their pitiful, hastily-made, 
almost begrudged graves. 



74 THE soldier's story. 



CHAPTER IV. 

Prison-Life in Andersonville. — Twelve Thousand Prisoners. — A 
Shelter constructed. — Philosophizing in Misery. — Want of Fuel 
and Shelter. — Expedients for Tents. — The Ration System. — Con- 
tinued Decrease of Amount. — Modes of Cooking. — Amusement 
from Misery. — "Flankers," or Thieves. — New Companions. — 
A Queer Character. — Knowledge of Tunnelling acquired. — A 
novel Method of Escape. — Mode of Tunnelling. — The Dead 
Line. — Inhumanity and Brutality in shooting Prisoners. — Pre- 
mium on such Acts. — Lack of Sanitary Regulations. — Sickness 
and Death very prevalent. — Loathsome Forms of Scurvy. — A nox- 
ious Swamp, and its Effects. — Untold Misery. — Large Accession 
of Prisoners. — Exposure to heavy Rains and hot Suns. — One 
Thousand Three Hundred and Eighty Deaths in one Week. — De- 
pression of Spirits, Insensibility, Insanity, and Idiocy. — Tendency 
to Stoicism. — More Philosophizing. — Human Sympathies a Cause 
of Sickness and Death. — Philosophy again. — Sad Cases of Death 
from Starvation. 

ri^HE prison at Andersonville was situated on two bill- 
J- sides, and through-^he centre ran a sluggish brook, 
branch, as it was commonly termed. There were no 
signs of vegetation in the pen — it had all been tram- 
pled out. Our squads were ordered to take their posi- 
tions near the hill-side, on the borders, and partially in a 
murky slough or swamp. This was between the brook, 
or branch, on the north side, and was used by the pris- 
oners as a " sink,'' until it had become pestilent with 



PRISON LIFE IN ANDERSON VILLE. 75 

dreadful stench. Sadly tliinldng of home, and its 
dreadful contrast here, that night we lay down in the 
rain and dirt, on the filthy hill-side, to endeavor to get 
rest. But when sleep visited us, it was with an accom- 
paniment of horrid dreams and fancies, more than ' 
realised in the horrors of the future, and familiar now, 
more or less, to the whole civilized world. With bur- 
dened hearts we realized how hard was our position. 
The first morning after our arrival about twenty pounds 
of bacon and a buslicl of Indian meal was given me to 
distribute among ninety men. We had no wood to 
cook with, when two of my comrades, with myself, 
succeeded in buying six or seven small pieces for two 
dollars, and soon got some johnny-cake made. At our 
coming into the stockade there were about ten thonsand 
prisoners, increased to about twelve thousand by our 
arrival. The next day three others with myself formed 
a mess together; and taking two of our blankets, con- 
structed a temporary shelter from sun and rain, and thus 
settled down, experiencing the common life of hunger 
and privations of prisoners. We soon became conver- 
sant with the ways and means of the prison. There is 
a certain flexibility of character in men that adapts 
itself with readiness to their circumstances. This adapt- 
ability to inevitable, unalterable fate, against which it 
is useless to strive, or where it is death to repine, softens 
much of the sufferings otherwise unendurable in such a 
life. In no position is this adaptability more fruitful 
of good results to its possessor than in prison. It en- 



76 THE soldier's story. 

ables the luckless prisoner to extract whatever of com- 
fort there may be in the barren species of existence 
which suri'ounds him, and mitigates the mental torments 
and pains endured by those who are suddenly thrown 
upon their own resources, amid the acutest Bufferings 
which squahd misery can inflict. AVhile some pass their 
time in useless repinings, others set themselves resolutely 
at work, like Robinson Crusoe, to develop the resources 
of their surroundings into all the comforts they can 
force them to yield. 

Originally the interior of the prison had been densely 
wooded with pitch-pine, in which that countiy abounds ; 
but at the time of our arrival it had been, with the ex- 
ception of two trees, entirely cut to supply the want 
of fuel demanded by the prisoners. The camp at that 
time was dependent upon the roots and stumps of the 
trees which had been cut down for fuel. A limited 
number of those who were among the first arrivals 
had constructed rude shelters of the branches of trees, 
thatched with pitch-pines to shed the rain. The com- 
mon shelter was, however, constructed with blankets, 
old shirts, &c., while a great number had no shelter at 
all, or burrowed for the want of one in the ground. An 
aristocratic shelter, which few could indulge in, was 
made of two blankets pinned together with wooden pegs, 
stretched upon a ridgepole running across two uprights 
stuck into the ground, in imitation of an A tent ; or two 
poles were tied together, Avith both the ends stuck into 
the ground, forming a semicircle. Over three of these 



THE RATION SYSTEM. 77 

a blanket was stretched. A hole was then dug two 
or three feet deep under the space sheltered by the 
blankets. These, as a rebel surgeon one day remarked, 
were little better than graves. ^^^len there was a 
sudden shower, as was often the case, these holes 
M'ould as suddenly fill with water, situated as most 
of them were on the side hill. All over camp men 
might be seen crawling out of holes like half-drowned 
kittens, wet, disconsolate, and crestfallen. Those who 
could summon the philosoj)hy to laugh at the ludicrous 
view of their troubles, would find but little comfort in 
such uncomfortable cu'cumstances. These shelters were, 
at best, but poor protection against rain or a tropical 
sun ; but, as poor as they were, many who had blankets 
could not, though surrounded by woods on the exterior 
of the prison, get the necessary poles or branches to 
construct them. Under such cu'cumstances the unlucky 
prisoner burrowed in the earth, or laid exposed to the 
fury of rain and sun, and often chilly nights and 
mornings. 

The organization in camp for the issue of rations 
was as follows : The men were divided into squads of 
ninety, over which one of their own sergeants was 
placed. Over three nineties was also a chief sergeant, 
who drew rations for the whole. Every twenty -four 
hours these sergeants issued rations, whioh they drcAv 
at the gate from the prison authorities. The sergeants 
of nineties issued to sergeants of thirty or ten to suit 
convenience, ancl facilitate the distribution of rations » 



*-.r*' 



78 THE soldier's story. 

The rations Avere brought into camp by mule teams, 
driven by negroes, or, more commonly, by prisonera 
paroled and detailed for the purpose. A sergeant of 
ninety men was entitled to an extra ration for his 
trouble. I resigned, however, my position as sergeant 
of ninety before I had held it twenty-four hours, as I 
had foreseen that the position required a great deal of 
work, and I did not believe in taking an extra ration, 
which would not have benefited me. It was a task, 
iiowever, which many among a multitude of hungry 
mouths were ready to take upon themselves, and but 
very few qualified to fill in an honorable, impartial 
manner. When men are cut down to very low rations, 
they are not always discriminating in attaching blame 
to the proper source, which made the place all the moi^e 
difficult to fill with credit. This I early foresaw, 
and, therefore, left the position to some one anxious 
to fill it. 

During the first month of our imprisonment the 
rations were better than at any subsequent period, 
except wood, of which by chance we got none. Yet 
even at this time the rations were miserably inadequate 
to anything like a healthy organization. Our rations 
per day, during the first month, were a little over a 
pint of Indian meal, partly of cob ground with the 
meal, which was made into mush, and which we called 
by the appropriate name of chicken feed. Once in two 
days we got about a teaspoonful of salt. At first, 
bacon was issued in small quantities of fifteen to twenty 



MODES OF COOKING. 79 

pounds to ninety men, but, after the first of July, this 
was dropped almost entirely from prison rations. Some- 
times, instead of Indian meal, we got rice or beans ; 
but each bean had had an occupant in the shape of a 
grub or worm. Our modes of cooking were entirely 
primitive. The meal was stirred into water, making 
a thick dough ; then a little meal was sprinkled on the 
bottom of a plate or half of a canteen, to keep the 
dough from sticking. The dough was then placed in a 
plate or canteen, which was set up at an angle of forty- 
five degrees, to be cooked before a fire. When the 
front of the cake was "done brown," the plate was 
feed upon a split stick, and held over the coals until 
it was baked or burned upon the bottom. Our meal 
was sometimes sifted through a split half of a canteen, 
in which holes had been punched with a sixpenny nail. 
But even this coarse sieve left us so little of meal for 
food, it was gradually abandoned as impracticable. 
In sheer necessity of hunger, we sacrificed quality to 
quantity. 

It was an amusing scene, sometimes, when three or 
four would group together to concoct a johnny-cake. 
One split wood with a wedge or a jackknife, another 
stirred up the meal, while a third got the fire ready. 
The process of baking brought out the amusing feti- 
tures of the group. One, on his hands and knees, acted 
as a pair of bellows, blowing up the fire ; another held, 
extended on a spHt stick, the johnny-cake, varying its 
position to suit the blaze or coals ; while a tliird split 



80 THE soldier's STORY. 

Sticks, and fed the fire. In this manner, at certain 
hours of the day, could be seen groups of men all 
over the stockade, with anxiety painted on their fea- 
tures, in pitch-pine smoke ; the fireman, on his hands 
and knees, blowing until red in the face, tears running 
down, making white furrows on his smoke-begrimed 
features ; sweating, puflSng, blowing, coughing, crying, 
and choking with smoke, especially when, as was often 
the case, an unlucky gust of wind blew the smoke 
down the fireman's throat. 

I remember, at this time, the history of one day's 
exertion in trying to get some food ready for my 
hungry stomach, which is so illustrative of the diffi- 
culty generally experienced, that I will relate it. I 
opened the programme one morning by getting ready 
to cook " mush." The wood consisted of some roots 
which I had " extracted " from the ground the day 
previous, and consequently was not very dry ; so, when 
I was stirring the meal the fire would go out, and 
while I was blowing the fire the tin pail would tip 
over. I worked three or four hours in this way 
without success, when I abandoned the task on account 
of a rain coming up, putting the wood in my pockets 
and hat to keep it dry. In the afternoon it cleared 
away, when a comrade and myself, impelled to the 
same purpose by a common hunger, went to work 
jointly for our mush. But after nearly blowing the 
breath out of our bodies, and getting the fire fairly 
under way, the wood gave out, or, more properly, 



A day's fast. 81 

was burned out. And, while we were in pursuit of 
more to finish our " scald " (for, with our most sanguine 
hopes, we did not expect anything more than merely to 
scald the meal), some one passing along stumbled, and 
upset the ingredients of our mush, and we arrived on 
the spot just in season to save the pail from the hands 
of ruthless "flankers" — another term for thieves used 
among us. Ruefully we looked at the composition on 
the ground, and then at each other's faces, and went to 
bed that night sadder and hungrier than we got up, 
without breakfast, dinner, or supper. 

The next morning, in sheer desperation through 
hunger, to which we had not got so thoroughly accus- 
tomed as we subsequently did, we sold some article of 
clothing for a johnny-cake about the size of the top 
of my hat, and ate it with comic voracity ; and I confess, 
with all my hunger, I could not but laugh, the whole 
group was so exceedingly comical and ludicrous. One 
of our number, never too fat, in about a month after 
our capture had become a picturesque combination of 
skin and bones, pitch-pine smoke, and dingy blue, sur- 
mounted by an old hat, through a hole in the top of 
which his hair projected like an Indian plume. As 
he eagerly, but critically, broke piece after piece for 
mouthfuls, and, as he termed the process of eating, 
demolished it, his critical eye detected a substance 
foreign to johnny-cake, which, upon nearer examina- 
tion, proved to be an overgrown louse, which had tragi- 
cally met his fate in Indian meal. The reader will 
6 



82 THE soldier's story. 

query, Did this spoil your appetite? I assure such, 
"not a bit;" for we ate it down to the crumbs, and 
hungrily looked into each other's face as though some 
one was to blame that there was no more. 

Cooking our bacon was generally performed by fix- 
ing it upon a sharp stick, and holding it over a fire ; 
by those who were lucky enough to possess the imple- 
ments, or utensils, by frying over a fire ; but in a great 
majority of cases was eaten raw, which was also the 
popular way of eating fresh meat, when we got it, as 
it was considered a cure and preventive for scurvy. 
But the custom, I believe, to be more owing to the 
scarcity of wood, than from any sanitary provision or 
forethought of ours. Wliat was prompted by necessity 
we made a virtue of, by seeing some good in every 
extreme into which we were forced by circumstances. 
I, for one, was always too hungry to wait for it to be 
cooked, especially when I had to build a fii*e and find 
wood. 

A favorite dish was prepared, by taking a pint of 
Indian meal, mixing it in water, and the dough thus 
made was formed into dumplings about the size of a 
hen's egg. These were boiled with bits of bacon, about 
as big as marbles, until they floated upon the top of the 
soup. Thus made, the dumplings were taken out, cut 
open, and the soup poured on, giving us a dish which 
was a great luxury, although under other circum- 
stances we would not have insulted our palates with 
such a concoction. Sometimes we made coffee of 



A QUEER CHAKACTEK. 83 

burned bits of bread, by boiling them in a tin cup, 
which was greedily drank, without sweetening or milk. 
This was our introduction into the living death of 
Anderson ville, which, in spite of its comic side, had 
not one gleam of comfort to illuminate the misery 
of bondage. Sad as was the introduction during our 
first month's imprisonment, it afterwards became inex- 
pressibly worse. 

About this time, I became acquainted with a soldier 
who had been in the Confederate prison at Cahawba. 
He had then been a prisoner a year, and was worn 
down to a mere shadow, by his restless spirit and want 
of nourishing food. He was pointed out to me repeated- 
ly as one who had escaped several times, and had been 
recaptured by bloodhounds. He introduced himself 
one day in a very characteristic manner. Coming 
along, he observed us eating, saying, " How are ye ? " 
sat down, and looking first at one of our party and then 
at another, to see how far it would do to go, he grad- 
ually helped himself to johnny-cake and molasses, 
which we happened to have as a luxury. With great 
coolness he gave a relishing smack to his lips, as he 
used up the last of the molasses on the last piece of 
johnny-cake, and said, "Those 'lasses are gx>od." He 
was a Kentuckian, and naturally a good deal of a fel- 
low. Nature, at least, had stocked him well with shrewd- 
ness, impudence, and daring, — qualities not to be de- 
spised in such a place. Through him I became initiated 
into all the mysteries of tunnelling, and other modes of 



84 THE soldier's STORY. 

egress from prison. I commenced my first tunnel with 
him, and was conversant with all his plans. 

One day this man said to me, that about all the way 
he knew of getting out the prison was to "die." They 
carry the dead out, but it is hard work for the living to 
get a sight. I did not exactly understand Billy, for I 
knew lie had too much of the game character to give 
up in despondency ; and as for dying, I had no idea he 
thought seriously of such a thing as long as there was 
a kick in him. You can imagine my surprise, to see 
two comrades seriously lugging poor Billy out on a 
stretcher one morning, with his toes tied together, — 
which was all the ceremony we had in prison in laying 
out the dead. I took a last look at poor Billy as he lay 
upon the stretcher, and said, "Poor fellow! I little 
thought he would go in this way." "He makes a very 
natural corpse," said one of the boys ; and sure enough, 
he looked the same almost as in life, only his face was 
a little dirtier if anything. The next day I was startled 
to hear, that after Billy was laid in the dead-house, 
he took to his legs as lively as ever, and walked away. 
He never was heard of in my prison experiences again, 
and probably escaped to Sherman's army, wliich was 
then at M{\£ietta. 

Tunnelling was performed in much the manner 
woodchucks dig their holes. First, a hole was sunk 
about five feet in the ground, then were commenced 
parallels, the hole sufficiently large to admit one. The 
labor was performed during the night, and the dirt 




" He was shot through tlie lungs, and laid near the dead line 
writhing in torments (luring most oftiie forenoon. " —Page 85. 



THE DEAD LINE. g^ 

carried off in haversacks and bags, and scattered around 
camp. The mouth of the tunnel was covered up during 
tJie day to prevent discovery, which was more liable 
to happen than otherwise, from the fact that great 
milucements of extra rations were offered to spies. I 
was engaged in digging, during the first month, on no 
less than four, which were all discovered before beino- 
finished. ° 

One of the great instruments of death in the prison 
was the dead line. This line consisted of a row of 
stakes driven into the ground, with narrow board strips 
nailed down upon the top, at the distance of about 
fifteen feet from the stockade, on the interior side. 
This line was closely guarded by sentinels, stationed 
above on the stockade, and any person who approached 
It, as many unconsciously did, and as in the crowd was 
often unavoidable, was shot dead, with no warning what- 
ever to admonish him that death was near. An instance 
of this kind came to my notice the second day I was in 
prison. A poor one-legged cripple placed one hand on 
the dead line to support him while he got his crutch 
which had fallen from his feeble grasp to the ground.' 
In this position he was shot through the lungs, and laid 
near the dead line writhing in torments during most of 
the forenoon, until at last death came to his relief. None 
dared approach him to relieve his sufferings through 
fear of the same fate. The guard loaded his musket 
after he had performed this dastardly act, and grinning 
with satisfaction, viewed the body of the dying, murt 



86 THE soldier's stoey. 

dered man, for nearly an hour, with apparent pleasure, 
occasionally raising the gun to threaten any one who, 
from curiosity or pity, dared to approach the poor fellow. 
In a similar manner men were continually shot upon 
the smallest pretext, and that it was notliing but a 
pretext was apparent from the fact that one man ap- 
proaching the dead line could have in no manner harmed 
the cumbersome stockade, even had he been inclined so 
to do, and a hundred men could not, with their united 
strength, have forced it. Frequently the guard fired 
indiscriminately into a crowd. On one occasion I 
saw a man wounded and another killed ; one was 
lying under his blanket asleej), the other standing some 
distance from the dead line. 

A key to this murderous, inhuman practice was to 
be found in a standing order at rebel headquarters, 
that " any sentinel killing a Federal soldier, approach- 
ing the dead line, shall receive a furlough of sixty days ; 
while for woundins: one he shall receive a furloufjh for 
thirty days." This order not only offered a permium 
for murder, but encouraged the guard in other outrages, 
as:ainst which we had no defence whatever. Men 
innocent of any intention to infringe the prison regula- 
tions were not safe when lying in the quiet of their 
blankets at night. Four or five instances happened 
within range of my observation at Anderson ville, and 
there were dozens of cases which I heard of, succeeding 
the report of guns in the stockade. Scarcely a night 
or day passed but the sharp crack of a rifle told of the 



OUTRAGES IN ANDEESONVILLE . 87 

murder of another defenceless victim. Men becoming 
tired of life committed suicide in this manner. They 
had but to get under the dead line, or lean upon it, and 
their fate was sealed in death. 

An incident of this kind came to my knowledge in 
July. A New York soldier had tried once or twice to es- 
cape, by wliich means he had lost his cooking utensils and 
his blanket, and was obliged to endure the rain and heat 
without protection, and to borrow, beg, or steal cook- 
ing implements, eat his food raw, or starve. Lying 
in the rain often at night, followed by the tropical heat 
of day, was torture which goaded him to desperation. 
He announced his determination to die, and getting over 
the dead line, was shot through the heart. One can- 
not be a constant witness to such scenes without beins: 
affected by them. I doubt not he saved himself by 
such a course much trouble and pain, anticipating by 
only a few weeks a death he must eventually have 
suffered. 

Under the tortures of imprisonment, where its con- 
tinuation is certain, is a man blamable in hastenins: or 
anticipating death by a few weeks or days, thus saving 
himself from the lingering tortures of death by exposure 
and starvation? God in his mercy only can answer it, 
and will at the final judgment day, when the prison 
victim and his unrelenting foe shall be arraigned before 
HiDi who noteth even the fall of a sparrow ! 

There being no sanitary regulations in camp, and 
no proper medical provisions, sickness and death 



88 THE soldiee's story. 

were Inevitable accompaniments of our imprisonment, 
Thousands of prisoners were so affected with scurvy, 
caused by want of vegetables, or of nutritious food, that 
their limbs were ready to drop from their bodies. I 
have often seen maggots scooped out by the handful 
from the sores of those thus afflicted. Upon the first 
attack of scurvy, an enervating weakness creeps over the 
body, which is followed by a disinclination to exercise ; 
the legs become swollen and weak, and often the cords 
contract, drawing the leg out of shape ; the color of the 
skin becomes black and blue, and retains pressure from 
the fingers as putty will. This is frequently followed by 
dropsical symptoms, swelling of the feet and legs. If 
the patient Avas subject to trouble with the throat, the 
scurvy would attack that part ; if afflicted Avith or pre- 
disposed to any disease, there it would seize and 
develop, or aggravate it in the system. 

In cases of this character, persons ignorant of their 
condition would often be trying to do something for a 
disease which in reality should have been treated as 
scurvy, and coidd have been prevented or cured by 
proper food. A common form of scurvy was in the 
mouth : this was the most horrible in its final results of 
any that afflicted the prisoners. The teeth would 
become loosened, the gums rot away, and swallowing 
the saliva thus tainted with the poison of scurvy, would 
produce scurvy in the bowels, which often took the 
form of chronic diarrhoea. Sometimes bloating of the 
bowels would take place, followed by terrible suffering 



BREEDING OF PESTILENCE. 89 

and death. Often scvxrvy sores would gangrene, and 
maggots would crawl from the flesh, and pass from the 
bowels, and, under the tortures of a slow death, the 
body would become, in part, putrid before death. In 
this manner died Corporal Gibson, an old, esteemed, 
and pious man of my company. Two or thr^e others 
also died in much the same manner. Corporal Gibson 
especially had his reason and senses clear, after most 
of his body was in a putrid condition. In other cases, 
persons wasted to mere skeletons by starvation and 
disease, unable to help themselves, died by inches the 
most terrible of deaths, with not a particle of medicine, 
or a hand lifted by those in charge of the prison for 
their relief. 

There was a portion of the camp, forming a kind of 
a swamp, on the north side of the branch, as it was 
termed by the rebels, which ran through the centre of 
the camp. This swamp was used as a sink by the 
prisoners, and was putrid with the corruption of human 
offal. The stench polluted and pervaded the whole 
atmosphere of the prison. When the prisoner was 
fortunate enough to get a breath of air outside the 
prison, it seemed like a new development of creation, 
so different was it from the poisonous vapors inhaled 
from this cesspool with which the prison air was reek- 
ing. During the day the sun drank up the most 
noxious of these vapors, but in the night the terrible 
miasma and stench pervaded the atmosphere almost to 
suffocation. 



90 THE soldier's STORY. 

In the month of July, it became apparent that, 
unless something was done to abate the nuisance, the 
whole camp would be swejit away by some terrible 
disease engendered by it. Impelled by apprehensions 
for the safety of themselves and the troops stationed 
around the camp, on guard, the rebel authorities of the 
prison furnished the necessary implements to the pris- 
oners, who filled about half an acre of the worst of the 
sink with earth excavated from the hill-side. The space 
thus filled in was occupied, almost to the very verge of 
the sink, by the prisoners, gathered here for the con- 
veniences of the place, and for obtaining water. Men, 
redueed by starvation and disease, would drag them- 
selves to this locality, to lie down and die uncared for, 
almost unnoticed. I have counted fifteen dead bodies 
in one morning near this sink, where they had died 
during the night. I have seen forty or fifty men in 
a dying condition, who, with their little remaining 
strength, had dragged themselves to this place for its 
conveniences, and, unable to get back again, were 
exposed in the sun, often without food, until death 
relieved them of the burden of life. Frequently, on 
passing them, some were found reduced to idiocy, and 
many, unable to articulate, would stretch forth their 
wasted hands in piteous supplication for food or water, 
or point to their lips, their glazed eyes presenting that 
staring fixedness which immediately precedes death. 
On some the flesh would be dropping from then* bones 
with scurvy ; in others little of humanity remained in 



TERRIBLE MORTALITY. 91 

their wasted forms but skin drawn over bones. Nothing 
ever before seen in a civilized country could give one 
an adequate idea of the physical condition to which 
disease, starvation, and exposure reduced these men. 
It was only strange that men should retain life so long 
as to be reduced to the skeleton condition of the great 
mass who died in prison. 

In June prisoners from Sherman's and Grant's armies 
came in great numbers. After the battles of Spottsyl- 
vania and of the Wilderness, over two thousand pris- 
oners came in at one time. Most of those who came 
through Richmond had their blankets taken from them, 
and in many instances were left with only shirt, hat, 
and pantaloons. These lay in groups, often wet through 
with rain at night, and exposed to the heat of a tropical 
sun daily. With such night and day were alike to be 
dreaded. The terrible rains of June were prolific of 
disease and death. It rained almost incessantly twenty- 
one days during the month. Those of the prisoners 
who were not by nature possessed of unyielding courage 
and iron constitutions broke down under the terrible 
inflictions of hunger, exposure, and mental torments. 
The scenes that met the eye on every side were not 
calculated to give hopeful tendencies to the mind dis- 
tressed by physical and mental torture. Men died at 
so rapid a rate that one often found himself wondering 
and speculating when and how his turn would come ; 
for that it must come, and that soon, seemed inevitable 
under the circumstances. No words can express the 



92 THE soldier's story. 

terrible sufferings which hunger and exposure inflicted 
upon the kickless inmates of Andersonville Prison. 
During one week there were said to have died thirteen 
hundred and eighty men. Death lost all its sanctity 
by reason of its frequent occurrence, and because of 
the inability of suffering men, liable at any moment to 
experience a like fate, to help others. To show funeral 
honors to the dead, or soothe the last moments of the 
dying, was impracticable, if not impossible. Those 
whose natures had not raised them superior to fate lost 
their good humor and gayety, and pined away in hope- 
less repinings ; — dreaming of home, and giving way to 
melancholy forebodings, which could be productive of 
no good result. Others, of an opposite mould of char- 
acter, whom nothing could daunt, still retained some- 
thing of their natural gayety and humor amid all the 
wretchedness by which they were surrounded. To such 
trials .were but so many incentives to surmount and 
overcome difficulties. If the prisoner gave way to 
languor and weakness, and failed to take necessary 
exercise, — if he did not dispose his mind to take cheer- 
ful views of his condition, and look upon the bright 
side of that which seemed to be but darkness and 
misery, — he might as well give up hope of life at once. 
In prison one must adapt himself to the circumstances 
which threaten to crowd him out of existence, or die. 
He must look upon filth, dirt, innumerable vermin, 
and even death, with complacency, and not distress 
himself about that which is unavoidable, while he must 



BATTLING FOR LIFE. 93 

never cease battling against them. No matter if he did 
know that his cooked beans had been shovelled from a 
cart in which, a few hours before, the dead had been 
piled up and taken away to the grave, — he couldn't 
afford to get disgusted and reject the sustenance on that 
account. He must eat the food and adapt himself and 
his appetite to relish the dose, which is not so difficult 
to a man when very hungry. There must be a general 
closing up of the avenues of delicacy and sensibility, 
and a corresponding opening of all that is cheerful and 
truly hopeful in one's nature. I do not mean that hope 
which buoys one up by unreasonable anticipations, and 
which, when disappointed, becomes despair. It should 
be a general, cheerful hopefulness, that builds no air- 
castles of exchange, or speedy liberation by raids, but 
sees hope even in the circumstances of misery, and 
draws comfort and consolation from the thought that 
things can be no worse. There must be a kind of 
mental "don't-care" sort of recklessness of the future, 
combined with doing what you can to comfort yourself 
now, which is, after all, the preservation of a soldier in 
thousands of cases. There is a kind of armor of indif- 
ference which yields to circumstances, but cannot be pen- 
trated by them. As soon as one gives way to melan- 
choly despondency, as thousands naturally do under 
such circumstances, the lease of such a man's life in 
prison is not worth purchasing. 

The occasion of so much sickness and death was found 
in the causes enumerated, with the insufficiency in quan- 



94 THE soldier's story. 

tity of food, its unsuitableness in quality, and the ab- 
sence of all vegetables. The heating nature of Indian 
meal — the cob ground with the corn, also had its eftects 
in producing an unhealthy condition of things. During 
July one could scarcely step without seeing some poor 
victim in his last agonies. The piteous tones of en- 
treaty, the famine-stricken look of these men, their 
bones in some cases worn through their flesh, were 
enough to excite pity and compassion in hearts of 
stone. 

Death by starvation and exposure was preceded by a 
mild kind of insanity or idiocy, when the mind felt not 
the misery of the body, and was unable to provide for 
its wants. We gave water and words of sympathy to 
wretches who were but a few degrees worse than our- 
selves. But there was dang-er when we jjave food that 
we might starve ourselves, while that which we fur- 
nished to another would not preserve his life. If you 
allowed every sick man to drink from your cup, you 
were liable to bring upon yourself the terrible infliction 
of scurvy in the mouth, which was as much to be 
dreaded as death. Even a gratification of your keenest 
human sympathies thus became the potent cause of 
self-destruction and suffering to him who indulged in 
so great a luxury. 

The terrible truth was, that in prison one could not 
attempt to relieve the misery of others more miserable 
than hmiself, Avithout placing himself in greater peril. 
Was it wonderful that the cries of dying, famished men 



I 



PHIIiOSOPHISING ON MISERY. 95 

were unheeded by those who were battling with fate to 
preserve their own lives? If there were some who 
turned ears of deafness to distressed tones of entreaty, 
who forgot the example of the " good Samaritan " in 
their own distress, the fault and sin (if sin or fault there 
was under such torture and condition) were surely not 
upon their own heads, but upon the heads of those who 
had crowded into our daily existence so much of misery 
as to leave no room for the gratification of kindly 
sympathies, and had drowned out the finer sensibilities 
in the struggles with despair and death for self-preser- 
vation. Subjects of pity rather than of blame, they 
were not allowed the luxury of pity and sympathetic 
action. Yet many there were, surrounded by and suf- 
fering acutest torture, who moved like angels of mercy 
among suffering companions stricken by famine and 
disease. 

It is a terrible thing to feel one's self starving ; to 
brace every nerve against the approach of death, and 
summon to the aid of the body all its selfishness : yet 
men, in spite of the necessity of so doing in order to 
preserve life, assisted and soothed one another in hours 
of sickness, distress, and melancholy ; and such had a 
reward in the consciousness of duty performed, of un- 
selfish devotion, surrounded by fiimine and death — the 
bitter cup of misery pressed to their own lips, yet having 
still a care for others, under circumstances of trial when 
the thoughts of most men were turned upon themselves, 
and oblivious to others' woes amid their own misery. 



96 THE soldier's story. 

Most prisoners, being only soldiers temporarily, have 
at variance two distinct elements of feeling, one spring- 
ing from their habitual and the other from their tempo- 
rary mode of life ; one springing from peaceful asso- 
ciations, with the seclusions of home, or the luxury of 
the business activity of city life ; the other from the 
more recent influences of the camp and battle-field. 
These incongruous elements are in constant antago- 
nism. One moment it is the soldier, improvident and 
careless of the future, reckless of the present, laughing 
at discomforts and pi'ivations, and merry in the midst 
of intense suffering. Then it is the quiet citizen, com- 
plaining of misfortune, sighing for home and its dear 
ones, dreaming of seclusion and peace, yielding to de- 
spondency and sorrow. And this is perhaps fortunate, 
for at least there is less danger that the prisoner shall 
become improvident with the one element, or a miser 
dead to every feeling with the other. Most prisoners, 
in such misfortunes, are apt to indulge in a kind of 
post-mortem examination of their previous life, to dis- 
sect that portion of their past history which is seldom 
anatomized without arriving at the conclusion tliat pres- 
ent misfortunes are nearly in all cases due to some rad- 
ical error in their own lives. Misfortunes render some 
men reckless ; others, on the contrary, become cautious 
through failure and wise through misfortune. And 
such, retracing in their leisure hours their paths of life, 
question the sorrowful spectres of perished hopes which 
haunt the crowded graveyards of the past. They draw 



INSAOTTY FROM STARVATION. 97 

from the past nought but cold realities ; they cut into 
the body of their blighted life and hopes, and seek to 
learn of what disease it died. This is rational ; it is 
instructive and courageous ; but, unfortunately, it is not 
pleasant. Better to light anew the corpse of the dead 
past, to in wreathe the torn hair with blossoms, to tinge 
the livid cheek with the purple flush of health, to en- 
kindle the glazed eyes with eloquent lustre, to breathe 
into the pallid lips the wonted echoes of a familiar voice, 
which may discourse to us pleasantly of long departed 
joys and of old happy hours. There is a piteous con • 
solation in it, like the mournful solace of those who, 
having lost some being near and dear to them, plant 
the dear grave with flowers. It is this inward self which 
is all his own that the prison leisure leads the speculative 
captive daily to analyze. After a voyage of memory 
over the ocean of the past, he returns to the sad present 
with a better heart, and endeavors, from the newly- 
kindled stars which have arisen above the vapory hori- 
zon of his prison life, to cast the horoscope of a wiser 
future. 

I have spoken of a mild kind of insanity which pre- 
cedes death caused by starvation and brooding melan- 
choly, in which the mind wanders from real to imaginary 
scenes. Private Peter Dunn, of my company, was an 
instance of this kind. At an early date of his impris- 
onment he lost his tin cup, which Avas with him, as 
commonly was the case throughout the prison, the only 
cooking implement. His blanket wa^ also lost, and he 
7 



98 THE soldiek's story. 

was left destitute of all shelter and of every comfort 
except that which was furnished him by companions 
who wore sufferers in common with himself, and not 
overstocked with necessaries and comforts. Gradually, 
as he wasted away, his mind wandered, and in imagina- 
tion he was the possessor of those luxuries which the 
imagination will fasten upon when the body feels the 
keenest pangs of hunger. With simple sincerity he 
would frequently speak of some luxury which he im- 
agined he had partaken of. Suddenly a gleam of intel- 
ligence would overspread his face ; he would speak of 
the prison, and say, "This is a dreadful place for the 
boys — isn't it ? I don't enjoy myself when I have any- 
thing good to eat, there are so many around me who 
look hungry." And then, gazing in my face, said, in 
the saddest modulations I ever heard in hiunan voice, 
"You look hungry too, Sarg." And then, sinking his 
voice to a whisper, added, " O dear ! I'm hungry my- 
self, a good deal." Poor, poor Peter ! he soon died a 
lingering death from the effects of starvation and expo- 
sure. In the lucid moments that preceded death, he 
said, as I stood over his poor famine-pinched form, 
" I'm dreadful cold and hungry, Sarg." He again re- 
lapsed into a state of wandering, with the names of 
" Mary " and " Mother " on his lips ; and the last faint 
action of life, when he could no longer speak, was to 
point his finger to his pallid, gasping lips, in mute en- 
treaty for food ! 

Charles E. Bent was a drummer in my company, a 



CASES OF SUTFEEING. 99 

fine lad, with as big a heart in his small body as ever 
throbbed in the breast of a man. He was a silent boy, 
who rarely manifested any outward emotion, and spoke 
but seldom, but, as his comrades expressed it, " kept up 
a thinking." I observed nothing unusual in his conduct 
or manner to denote insanity, until one afternoon, about 
sundown, one of his comrades noticed the absence of a 
ring commonly worn upon his hand, and inquired where 
it was. " When I was out just now," he said, " my sis- 
ter came and took it, and gave it to an angel." The 
next day, as the sun went down, its last rays lingered, 
it seemed to me, caressingly upon the dear, pallid face 
of the dead boy. His pain and sorrow were ended, 
and heartless men no longer could torture him with 
hunger and cruelty. 

But while the minds of many became unsettled with 
idiocy or insanity, there were other instances where a 
vivid consciousness and clearness of mental vision were 
retained to the very verge of that country " from whence 
no traveller returns." 

C. H. A. Moore was a drummer in my company — 
the only son of a widowed mother : all the wealth of 
maternal affection had been fondly lavished upon him. 
In him all her hopes were centred, and it was with great 
reluctance that she finally agreed to his enlistment. A 
soldier's life, to one thus reared, is at best hard ; but to 
plunge one so young and unaccustomed even to the 
rudiments of hardships into the unparalleled miseries 
of Andersonville, seemed cruelty inexpressible. He 



100 THE soldier's STORY. 

was just convalescent from a typhoid fever when cap- 
tured. In prison he gradually wasted away until he 
died. The day previous to his death I saw and con- 
versed with him, tried to encourage and cheer him ; but 
a look of premature age had settled over his youthful 
fa?e, which bore but little semblance to the bright, ex- 
pressive look he wore when he enlisted. He Avas per- 
fectly sane, and conversed with uncommon clearness 
and method, as though his mind had been suddenly 
developed by intense suffering. His face bore an un- 
changed, listless expression, which, I have noticed in 
prison, betokened the loss of hope. He spoke of home 
and of his mother, but his woi'ds were all in the same 
key, monotonous and weary, with a stony, unmoved 
expression of coimtenance. On a face so young I 
never saw such iudescribabie hopelessness. It Avas de- 
spaii' petrified ! And when I think of it, even now, it 
pierces me to the heart. His was a lingering death by 
starvation and exposure, with no relief from unmitigated 
misery. It seems to me that God's evei'lasting curse 
must surely rest upon those who thus knowingly allowed 
hundreds of innocent young lives to be blotted out of 
existence by cruelties unheard of before in the annals 
of civilized Avarfare. It seems to me that in the future 
'the South, who abetted so great a crime against civ- 
ilization and humanity, against Chi'istianity and even 
decency, must stand condemned by the public opinion 
of the Avorld, until she has done " works meet for re- 
pentance." 



PRISON VOCABULARY. 101 



CHAPTER V 

Prison Vocabulary. — Punishment of Larcenies. — Scenes of Vio- 
lence. — Destitution provocative of Troubles. — Short Rations. 

— More Fights. — Advantages of Strength of Body and Mind. — 
New Standards of Merit. — Ingenuity profitable. — Development 
of Faculties. — New Trades and Kinds of Business. — Cures for 
all Ills and Diseases. — Trading to get more Food. — Burden of 
Bad Habits. — Experience in Trade. — Stock in Trade eaten up 
by Partner. — A Shrewd Dealer destroys the Business. — Trading 
Exchange. — Excitement in the Issue of Rations. — A Starving Man 
killed. — His Murderer let off easy through Bribery. — Consider- 
able Money in the Camp. — Tricks upon Rebel Traders in Prison. 

— Counterfeit or Altered Money disposed of. 

THE prison had a vocabulary of words peculiarly 
its own, which, if not new in themselves, were 
novel in their significance. A thief, for instance, was 
termed a "flanker," or a "half shave," the latter term 
originating in a wholesome custom, which prevailed in 
pris(m, of shaving the heads of those who were caught 
pilfering, on one side, leaving the other untouched. 
Thus they would remain sufficiently long to attract 
universal attention and derision. The shaving was a 
less punishment in itself than its final consequences, for 
a fellow with half-shaven crown was lucky if he escaped 
a beating or a ducking every hour of the day. Where 



102 THE soldier's stoey. 

a thief had the boldness to steal in open daylight, and 
by a dash, grab and rnu, to get off with his booty, he 
was termed a "raider," wliich was considered one grade 
above the sneaking "flanker." The articles stolen 
were usually cooking utensils, or blankets, for the want 
of which, many a man died. Either epithet, "flanker" 
or "raider," hurled at a fast-retreating culprit, would 
insure a general turnout in the vicinity, to stop the 
offender. If the thief had shrewdness, and was not too 
closely pursued, he often assumed a careless appear- 
ance, mingled unperceived with his pursuers, and 
joined in the "hue and cry." Woe to him who at- 
tracted suspicion by undue haste when such a cry Avas 
raised ; for although his errand might be one of necessity 
or mercy, he was sure to be hurt before it was ascer- 
tained that he was not the offending person, and his 
only consolation was in the fact of his innocence, or the 
thought that his head, if some sorer, was wiser than 
before. 

Scenes of violence Avere continually enacted in the 
prison. Murders that thrilled the blood with horror 
were at one time of frequent occurrence, — of which 
we shall speak more particularly in coming pages, — 
perpetrated by bands of desperadoes who jumped Uncle 
Sam's bounties before they were retained in the firm 
grasp of luilitary vigilance, and, when fairly caught, 
rather than fight were taken prisoners voluntarily. Not 
an hour of the day passed without some terrible fight — 
often over trivial matters — taking place in the stock- 



SCENES OF VIOLENCE. 103 

ade. The reasons which provoked fights we^e not often 
plain; but one fact was ever apparent, viz., that hun- 
ger and privation did not sweeten sour tempers, or 
render the common disposition at all lamb-like. A 
piece of poor corn-bread, picked up in the dirt, a little 
Indian meal, or a meatless bone, which a dog or pig of 
New England extraction would turn up his nose at, 
would provoke violent discussions as to ownership, 
in which muscle, rather than equity, settled facts. Some 
of these personal encounters ended in a general fight, 
where all who were desirous of that kind of recreation 
took a part. It was quite a curious fact that when 
rations were scarcest in prison, fights were plentiest. 
In the absence of food, some took pleasure in beating 
each other. "I've not had anything to eat to-day, 
and would like to lick some varmint as has," said 
Kentucky Joe, a gaunt, half-starved, but never de- 
sponding fellow. "I'm your man," said Pat B., and 
at it they went, till Kentucky was beaten to his satis- 
faction, and acknowledged that " a Warmint ' who had 
eaten corn-dodger for breakfast was * too much ' for one 
'as hadn't.'" The writer, seeing no fun in a muss, 
kept out of them, foreseeing misery enough, without 
a broken head to nurse. The great mass could ill 
aflford to expend strength in such encounters, and it was 
usually easy to keep out of them w^ithout sneaking. 

I have often, however, seen men who were weak with 
disease, and weak to such a degree that they could 
scarcely stand, engage in pugilistic encounters piteous 



104 THE soldier's STORY. 

to contemplate. I call to memory two almost skeleton 
men, whom I once saw enoao-ed in fio-litinnf for the 
possession of a few pine knots ! Bareheaded, in a 
broiling sun, barefooted, their clothes in tatters, they 
bit and scratched, and rolled in the dirt together. I 
left them, their hands clutched in each other's hair, — 
with barely remaining strength to rally a kick, — gazing 
into each other's eyes with the leaden, lustreless glare of 
famine stamped there — a look which I cannot describe, 
but which some comrade of misery will recognize. 

The strong often tyrannized over the weak, and as 
we see it in all gatherings of men, the strong in physi- 
cal health and in possessions kept their strength, while 
the many weak grew weaker and Aveaker, until they 
were crowded out of life into the small space gi'udg- 
ingly allowed them for graves. Each man stood or fell 
on merits different from those which had been valued 
by friends at home. He found himself measured by 
different standards of merit from those used in any of 
his previous walks of life. Rough native force or talent 
showed itself by ingenious devices for making the most 
of little. He who could make Indian meal and water 
into the most palatable form was " looked up to." 
He v;ho could cook with little wood, and invent from 
the mud a fireplace in which to save fuel, was a genius ! 
The producer of comforts from the squalid, crude 
material of life was respected as much as hunger 
would allow us to respect anything. He it was who 
got a start in the prison world, and managed to live. 



TRADING TALENT. 105 

It was desirable on the part of prisoners to follow 
some trade or occupation which should give to the 
individual means to purchase the few desirable luxuries 
which could be obtained of those who came into prison 
from among the rebels with permission to trade. By 
this method there were hopes of life, even if existence 
was misery. Yankee ingenuity was consequently taxed 
to the utmost to invent "from the rouoh" some 
kind of business that would pay — an onion, a potato, 
or an extra allowance of Indian meal per week. Under 
the fruitful maxim that "necessity is the mother of 
invention," it was surprising how trades and business 
started into life. Had these men been placed in a 
forest where raw material could readily be got at, I 
believe they would have produced every " item " of a 
city's wants, so well were we represented in the trades. 
The strivings for life were piteous, but often comical in 
their developments. Some traded their hats and boots, 
or a slyly-kept watch, for beans or flour, and with this 
elementary start began " sutlers' business." Another 
genius developed a process for converting Indian meal 
into beer, by souring it in water. And " sour beer," as 
it was termed, speedily became one of the institutions. 
This beer was vended around the camp by others, who 
pronounced it a cure for scurvy, cclds, fever, gangrene, 
and all other ills the stockade was heir too, and they 
were many. You would at one part of the stockade 
hear a voice loudly proclaiming a cure for scurvy ; you 
approach, and find him vending " sour beer ; " — another 



106 THE soldier's STORY. 

proclaiming loudly a cure for diarrhcea : he would be 
selling " sour beer ; " and so through a long catalogue 
of evils would be proclaimed their remedies. 

One day I was almost crushed in a crowd who were 
attracted by a fellow crying aloud, " Stewed beans, 
with vinesfar on to um ! " The vineijar turned out to 
be "sour beer." Stuck upon a shingle I observed a 
sign which read, " Old Brewery ; Bier for Sail, by the 
glass or bucketful, hole sail, retail, or no tail at all." 
I remember one ingenious fellow, who, with a jackknife 
and file and a few bits of wire, was engaged in getting 
into ticking order " played-out " watches , that had re- 
fused to go unless they were carried ; and the inge- 
nuity he displayed in coaxing them to tick was surpris- 
ing. In one instance the watch tinker mentioned made 
for a friend of mine an entire watch-spring of whale- 
bone, which set the watch ticking in such a tremendous 
manner, for a few minutes after being wound up, as to 
call forth the admiring ejaculation from the Secesh pur- 
chaser, " Gosh, how she does go it ! " The watch 
stopped — ^Wund down," as the amazed Johnny after- 
wards said, " quicker nor a flash." You will readily un- 
derstand that prisoners cared but little about watches 
except so far as they were tradable for Indian meal, 
hog, or hominy. 

Another occupation was cooking beans and selling 
them by the plateful to such hungry ones as covild af- 
ford to trade for them. Various were the means of 
" raising the wind " to obtain a supply to carry on the 



MODES OF TRADE. 107 

trade. Often some article of clothing, or buttons off 
the jacket, were traded for them. But a more common 
method was to trade the buttons or clothing for tobacco, 
and then trade tobacco for beans ; for those addicted to 
the use of the weed would frequently remark that it 
was easier to go without a portion of their food, how- 
ever scanty, than without their tobacco. In prison one 
thus paid the penalties of bad habits previously formed. 
One accustomed to the habit of taking a dram of some- 
thing stimulating each day, died in prison for want of it. 
Habits, like chickens, "come home to roost," and were 
often the millstones that sunk their possessors into the 
hopeless misery which went before death. Thus, when 
only about half a pint of beans, uncooked, per day 
were issued, sometimes with a little bacon, men would 
lay aside a few each day to trade for tobacco. 

The modes of selling were various ; but the most 
common way of finding purchasers by those who had 
but a small capital of a few pints of beans, was to pro- 
ceed to the principal thoroughfare, — for even here we 
were compelled to have paths unoccupied by recumbent 
men and their "traps," through a general understand- 
ing, or we should have continually trod on one 
another. Broadway, as we termed it, was the scene 
of most of the trading done in camp. The venders, 
sitting with their legs under them, like tailors, pro- 
claimed loudly the quantity and quality of beans or 
mush they could sell for a stated price. Some would 
exultantly state that theirs had pepper and salt " on to 



108 THE soldier's STORY. 

um ; " and sometimes vinegar was cried out as one of 
the virtues possessed by the vender of beans, and then 
there would be a rush to see, if not to eat. Sometimes 
I have seen on Broadway from fifty to seventy venders 
of beans, who, together with small gamblers with 
sweat-boards, on which could be staked five cents, and 
hasty-pudding dealers and sour beer sellers, all of whom 
sat on the ground, looking anxious, dirty, and hungry 
enough to make the hardest part of their task a resist- 
ing of the temptation to eat up their stock in trade. 
I cannot refrain from narrating my own experience in 
that line, it was so characteristic of experience common 
to those who engaged in like speculations. 

Clifton V. and myself possessed a joint capital of 
an old watch, mention of which has been made, and a 
surplus of one pair of army shoes, — for I went bare- 
foot, disdaining to abridge the freedom of my feet when 
it interfered with business. We invested them in beans, 
which were, like those usually issued, possessed, previ- 
ous to our possession, by grubs and worms. The terms 
of our copartnership were, that he, " Cliff," was to do 
the selling, while I and a companion named Damon 
cooked, bargained for wood, and transacted the general 
business of the "concern." Accordingly Cliff showed 
his anxious face and raised his treble voice shrilly in 
the market-place. The first day's sale brought us about 
one pint of extra beans. The next day Cliffs hunger 
got the better of his judgment and firm resolve to be 
prudent, and he ate up near half our stock in trade, 



PERSONAL EXPERIENCE IN TRADE. 109 

which was ve.xatious; but I could not reprove him, 
seeino- how cheerful it made him feel, and how sorry he 
said he really was. Besides, his full stomach gave lum 
rose-colored views of the morrow's trade. 

The morrow came, and Cliff made a "ten-strike, 
selling off all the beans I could cook, and was beside 
himself at the prospects of our having enough to eat 
"rio-ht straight along." The next morning I invested 
lar-ely in beans, in all about three quarts, wet measure, 
and borrowed a kettle that would cook about half of 
them, and paid for the convenience in trade. That day 
proved the ruin of the bean trade. Cliff came back 
despondently, declaring beans didn't seU ; and the mys- 
tery was soon solved by the fact that on the south side 
of the branch they were issuing cooked beans. Where- 
upon, ascertaining beyond a doubt the truth of this, 
Cliff and myself sat down and ate one good square 
meal, did the same at supper time, finished them for 
breakfast next morning, and lived at least one day with 
full stomachs — a ch-cumstance that seldom happened 
before or afterwards in our prison experience. Thus 
ended the bean trade. 

After rations were issued, there would be a general 
meeting of a densely packed crowd, all trying to trade 
for something more palatable, or for that which they 
had not got. Some would cry out, "Who will trade 
cooked beans for raw?" "Who wiH trade wood for 
beans ^ " " Who will trade salt for wood ? " while some 
.peculator would trade little bits of tobacco for any kind 



110 THE soldier's STORY. 

of rations. The issue of rations was often a moment 
of fearful excitement. A crowd of five or six thousand, 
like a hungry pack of wolves, would fill the space be- 
fore the gateway, all scrambling to get a look at the 
rations, as though even the sight of food did them good. 
At one time, during such a scene, one of the dstailed 
men, who acted as a teamster, — and those so employed 
were always men that were loudest in blaming our gov- 
ernment and "old Abe," and were insolent and well 
fed, — when one of the pack of hungry wi*etches put 
his hand out to clutch a falling crumb from the cart, the 
teamster beat his brains out with one blow of a club. 
He was tried by our stockade court of justice, (?) and 
condemned — to cart no more bread; owing, doubtless, 
to the fact of his having a few greenbacks, made in 
selling our rations. 

Among the occupations of the prison was that of 
baker. The ovens were made of clay, kneaded and 
formed into bricks. The foundation was laid with 
those bricks while they were in a damp condition, 
being allowed to dry in the sun for two or three days, 
and then were ready as a basis for the oven. Sand 
was first carefully heaped upon the centre of the founda- 
tion, in shape of the interior of it, when done ; over this 
mould the bricks were laid, and dried until the sand 
making the mould would bear removal, which was care- 
fully done by the use of sticks, at the opening which 
was left for a door. A fire was then built inside, after 
which it was ready for use. There were only a 



OCCUPATIONS. Ill 

favored few who got wood enough to consummate and 
carry on such an undertaking. The ovens described 
baked very good johnny-cake, and sometimes wheat 
biscuit. It was a convenience to be able to get rations 
cooked for three or four at halves. Thus our scanty 
rations often had to be diminished by one half, or eaten 
raw. There were others who followed the trade of 
bucket-makers, and very fair wooden buckets were 
made with no other tools than twine and a jackknife. 
As all water, mth exceptional cases of those who owned 
wells, had to be brought from the brook, — often quite a 
distance for weak men to travel in the sun, — these 
were very desirable. There were several kettle-makers, 
who found material, somehow, of sheet tin and iron 
from the top of rail-cars, smuggled into prison by the 
rebels, who were fond of Yankee greenbacks. These 
were also a convenience to those who formed a mess, 
and made a saving of wood by cooking tog'ether. 
These kettles were made with no other implements than 
a common railroad spike. They were made in the 
manner government camp-kettles are made, by in- 
geniously bending the iron together in seams, in this 
manner rendering them water-tight without solder. 
Thus Yankee ingenuity developed resources where, at 
first sight, there seemed nothing but barrenness and 
misery. I never saw a friction-match in the stockade ; 
I doubt if there were any ; yet there were always fires 
somewhere, — how procured I could never understand, 
except on the supposition that they never went out. 



112 THE soldier's STORY. 

I have entered thus minutely upon a description of 
these trades and occupations in prison, from the fact that 
it explains many apparently conflicting statements made 
by prisoners. While those thus engaged often got the 
means of subsistence, they were the exceptions of one 
to a thousand of the great mass of prisoners, who were 
daily perishing for want of food and from exposure. 
There was quite a sum of money cu-culating in camp, in 
the aggregate ; but eventually it got into the hands of 
the Secesh, who were rabid for the possession of green- 
backs. The rebels were constantly coming into the 
prison to trade, having first obtained permission of 
Wirz, the commandant of the "interior of the prison," 
as he was termed. They were fond of buying Yankee 
boots, watches, and buttons. All superfluous things, 
such as good caps, boots, &c., were freely traded 
in exchange for anything eatable, or for wood. One 
fact was quite observable — that when the Johnnies came 
in to trade the second time, they were sharper than they 
were at their first visit. The process of cutting their 
teeth was rather gradual ; but after a while they would 
become a match at driving a sharp bargain Avith the 
sharpest kind of " Yanks," and prided themselves on 
what they termed Yankee tricks. Buttons were in 
great demand by them, especially New York and staflT 
buttons, for which large prices were paid, and eagerly 
traded for. 

On one occasion a Jolnmy came in to trade, who 
was evidently as unsophisticated and green us the 



TRICKS UPON REBELS. 113 

vegetables he had for sale. He traded in the first place 
for a pair of army shoes, laid them down beside him, 
and while busy seeing to his " fixings," one of the boys 
passed the shoes around to a companion, who straight- 
way appeared in front, and before the Johnny had 
time to think of anything else, challenged his attention 
for a trade. A trade was agreed upon, and the price 
paid, before the Johnny found out that though pro- 
gressing in trade, he had but one pair of shoes. So, for 
safety of these precious decorations, he picked them up, 
and holding them in his arms, indignantly declared, 
" Durned if I can trade with yourn Yanlis in that sort 
o' way, no how." We were, according to his exposi- 
tion of the matter, " rather considerable right smart at 
picking up traps what wan't thar own." He was thus 
entertaining the boys with these original views, when 
one of our fellows, just to clinch what had been so aptly 
stated by the chivalrous representative, stepped up 
behind him and cut off four staff buttons, which adorned 
the rear of a long, swallow-tailed, butternut-colored, 
short-waisted coat. After executing this rear move- 
ment, he appeared in the crowd at the front, and 
offered them for sale. The Johnny took the bait, and 
traded his last vegetables for his own buttons, and 
started off highly pleased ; and so were the boys. On 
the way out of prison our Secesh friend met a com- 
rade, whose attention he called to the buttons, "like um 
he had on the tail " of his coat, whereupon his comrade 
looked behind, and informed him that " thar was not a 



114 THE soldier's STORY. 

clurned button tliar," when our trading Jolirmy loudly 
declared, with a rich sprinkling of oaths, that "these 
yere durned Yanks had orter have their ears buttoned 
back and be swallowed." 

An Ohio boy at one time set himself up in the provis- 
ion business by altering a greenback of one doUar into 
one hundred. We considered it fair to take every 
advantage of them we could contrive, and it amused us 
to hear them gravely charge us with want of honesty. 
Says one of them one day to me, " I've hcarn that yourn 
Yanks, down thar whar you live, make wooden pump- 
kin seeds, and I'll be dod rot if I don't believe I got 
some of um and planted, a year afore this war, for 
not a durned one cum'd up 'cept what the pesky hina 
scratched up." 



QUANTITY OF RATIONS. 115 



CHAPTER VI. 

Rations decreased, and worse in Quality. — Crowded Condition of 
the Prison. — Heavy Rains and Increased Sickness. — Much Filth 
and Misery. — Hunger a Demoralizer. — Plots exposed for Extra 
Rations. — Difficulties of Tunnelling. — A Breath of Outside Air 
and New Life. — An Escape under Pretext of getting Wood. — 
Captured by Bloodhounds after a Short Flight. — Something learned 
by the Adventure. — A Successful Escape believed to be possible. 

— Preparations for one. — Maps and Plans made. — A New Tun- 
nelling Operation from a Well. — The Tunnel a Success. — The 
Outer Opening near a Rebel Camp Fire. — Escape of a Party of 
Twenty. — Division into Smaller Parties. — Plans of Travel. — ■ 
Bloodhounds on the Path. — The Scent lost in the Water. — Va- 
rious Adventures. — Short of Provisions. — Killing of a Heifer. — 
Aided by a Negro. — Bloodhounds again. — Temporary Escape. — 
Fight with the Bloodhounds. — Recapture. — Attempted Strategy. 

— The Pay for Catching Prisoners. — Reception by Wirz. — Im- 
provement by the Expedition. — Some of the Party never heard 
from. — Notoriety by the Flight. 

THE last of June the rations became less in quan- 
tity, and worse in quality ; which, together with 
the fact that the prison, originally intended for but ten 
thousand, was now crowded with over twenty thousand 
souls, with the incessant rains of the month, made 
our situation anything but comfortable. During this 
month it rained twenty-one days, almost without inter- 
mission. This stirred up the refuse garbage and dirt 



116 THE SOLDIEE'S STORY. 

buried by those who were feeble and sick beneath the 
surface of the ground one or two feet. And whether 
at night, when we lay down, or in the morning when 
we sat upon our only bed and seat (the ground) , it was 
miserably wet, dirty, and disagreeable with unpleasant 
odors. Neither could one get accustomed to, or be 
able to blunt the senses to, the existence of so much 
misery. 

A great portion of my time from May to the last of 
June was spent in unavailing attempts at escape by 
means of tunnels. I was engaged in six, which were 
discovered by the prison authorities before their comple- 
tion. Hunger is a great demoralizer, and there were 
men in prison who for an extra ration would inform the 
authorities of the prison of plots and plans in which 
they themselves were actively engaged. There, no 
doubt, was a struggle with hunger before it obtained 
mastery over them. Starve a man, and you stunt the 
growth of all his finer qualities, if you do not crush 
them out entii-ely. It changes the expression of his 
face ; his mode of walking becomes loose, undecided ; 
his intelligence is dimmed. Hunger blunts the keenest 
intelligence, and deadens susceptibility to wrong doing, 
and mere moral wi'ongs look small, or seem overbal- 
anced, when placed by the side of food. 

If you narrow down a man's purpose to sustaining 
his body — let his be a continual struggle for a foot- 
hold upon life, with uncertainty as to its results — give 
a man, in fact, crime with bread, on the one hand, and 



TUNNELLING. 117 

on the other, integrity and truth with death — the thou- 
sand recollections of the old home, with the arms of a 
dear mother or wife or cliildren that once encircled his 
neck — all these recollections bid liim live. Conse- 
quently, it was difficult to trust men with secrets which 
might be sold for bread. Again, an impediment 
existed in digging tunnels in disposing of the earth 
excavated, in such a manner as not to attract suspicion 
and consequent detection. These were the potent 
causes of failure in all our tunnelling plans. The 
authorities were continually on the lookout for any 
trace of tunnelling. "Py tam," said Captain Wirz 
to some fellow who had been detected tunnelling, " vy 
don't some of you Yankees get out? mine togs are 
getting 'ungry to pite you." 

I had been engaged on so many tunnels which were 
failures, that I began to regard them as an unprofitable 
speculation, yielding no prospects of a desirable nature. 
In this frame of mind, I often queried if there was not 
some method by which a tunnel might be successfully 
completed, and began to look round me for the material 
with which to practically solve so grave a problem. 
One day, by much " gassing " and manoeuvring, 3 
managed to get outside the stockade, under guard, 
with several of my comi'ades, to obtain wood. This 
was the first time since my imprisonment that I had 
got a breath of the sweet air, trod upon the green 
grass, scented the sweet fragTance of the wood, and 
heard the carolling of birds. It was like a new 



118 THE soldier's STOEY. 

development of creation — some fairy land ! The 
woods and verdant pastures all seemed so different 
from the terrible pen in which we had been confined 
for weeks, tliat nothing ever thrilled me vrith so strange 
a vigor and elasticity. I cannot express my feelings 
more than to say that I never had any previous ideas 
of how beautiful the grass and woods were until sud- 
denly contrasted with the terrible dearth of that dreadful 
prison. My blood thrilled quick that morning to every 
breath that reached me in the cool wood, and every 
note of rejoicing freedom from the light-hearted birds 
found responsive echoes in my heart. 

The guards were not very strict, seemingly more 
bent on trading with the prisoners than in preventing 
them from rimning away. I commenced picking up 
sticks, and thus gradually worked my way beyond 
them. All at once I fotmd myself out of sight of the 
rebel sentinels, whom I left trading peanuts for buttons 
with other prisoners. For fear some guard might yet 
see me, I continued to pick sticks and bits of wood, 
thinking, if they found me so employed, this would 
deter them from firing at me, and lull suspicions they 
naturally might have that I was trying to escape. I 
looked around, and saw at a distance several of my 
companions, who had talvcn the hint, foUo^ving me, 
picking sticks in the same manner. AVe got together, 
and, wdthout saying a word, by mutual consent, dropped 
our wood, and ran like mad creatures through the woods 
for several miles. That night we travelled, witli the 



AN ESCAPE AJSTD CAPTURE. 119 

exception of one hour, which was passed beneath a tree 
trying to get sleep, in the drenching rain. The next 
morning we were captured by bloodhounds while cling- 
ing to trees, and, more frightened at the dogs than hurt 
by them, were carried back to the prison, where we 
reluctantly took up our quarters again, after receiving 
a damning from the accomplished (?) " conomander 
of the prison." 

This adventure was one advantage to me. It showed 
me the way in which prisoners were hunted. I also 
learned the manner the guards were picketed on the 
outside of the prison, and fixed in ray mind, by obser- 
vation, the location of each. I got acquainted with one 
of the men engaged in hunting prisoners, and remarked 
to liim that he would doubtless get a chance to hunt me 
again, and I would give him more of a chance " for 
travel and promotion," as we say to our raw recruits 
when enlisting them. Tliis I said jocosely, not know- 
ing what advantage it might prove to me in trying the 
same dodge again. Not long after, several of my 
friends tried the same method, and one was captured 
twenty miles from the prison while eating a hearty 
breakfast at a house where he was trapped. All this 
satisfied me that, with a few hours' start and with suffi- 
cient boldness, an escape was possible, in fact, almost 
certain, if unpursued by the dogs. Reflecting in this 
manner, I borrowed a map, which had been smuggled 
into prison, from which I traced on paper, previously 
greased in bacon fat to make it transparent and tough. 



120 THE soldier's STORY. 

a map of the portion of country needful for my project, 
with a scale of miles and points of the compass indi- 
cated on the same, besides possessing myself of all 
the information I could gather from numbers of pris- 
oners who had from time to time been recaptured after 
escaping from prison. They all had their theories of 
throwing the dogs off the scent. One believed that red 
pepper rubbed upon the soles of the shoes would cause 
the dogs to abandon the trail ; another had faith that 
fresh blood would have the same marvellous effect, and 
so on through the whole range of men who had been 
near successful in escaping. On one point, however, 
they all agreed, viz., that no dog could follow a man 
in the water on a log, or wading, any more than he 
could through the air, if flying. 

While looking around in prison one day, hoping and 
wishing for something to " turn up " by which I might 
solve the grave question of escape, I observed an old 
well, partially dug, from ten to twelve feet from the 
dead line, which had been finally abandoned after dig- 
ging over thirty feet without obtainmg water. Here 
seemed an opening for several young men. And I 
thought the matter over until satisfied that a tunnel 
might be successfully completed if commenced in this 
well. One of my company had his "shebang"* near 
the well ; and, as he Avas a trusty, enterprising fel- 
low, I laid my plans before him, and finally we deter- 

* Tent, spot, or blanket, or place of residence. 



ANOTHER TUNNELLING OPEEATION. 121 

mined to go into the matter that night. We made a 
rope from an old overcoat which he possessed, and tying 
it around my waist, I was lowered into th& well about 
seven feet, not without misgivings that I might travel 
the other twenty-five quicker than was good for my 
health, by the catastrophe of the rope's breaking, — for 
shoddy is doubtful material, — or its slipping from the 
weak grasp of my confederate. I scooped with a half 
canteen a place big enough to sit in. The next day 
my comrade borrowed a rope, for the alleged purpose 
of digging the well deeper ; and that night we dug in 
earnest, and made full eight feet. As daylight came 
on, we stopped up the mouth of the tunnel with sticks 
and mud, in such a manner that any one looking into 
the well would not mistrust that there was a tmmel 
being dug therein. Gradually we increased our num 
bers until we had twenty men at work, all of whom we 
knew could be trusted, as they belonged mostly to our 
battalion. We organized four reliefs, each of which 
were to dig in the tunnel two hours during the night. 
This made eight hours' good labor, which, considering 
that we could not commence very early at night, or 
continue very late in the morning, for fear of discovery, 
was doing well. The dirt excavated during the night 
was tumbled into the well, and the next day we were 
engaged, apparently, vnth the innocent task of digging 
for water, — an almost hopeless task, — when in reality 
our sole intentions were to keep the well from filling 
up with the dirt excavated from the tunnel during the 



122 THE soldier's story. 

night, without exciting suspicion. INIany a time we 
were joked while engaged digging out the well, on 
tunnelling "through to China," the perpetrator of 
the joke little suspecting that we really were tunnel- 
ling. 

Finally, after almost incredible labor, for men in our 
half-starved condition, we had got a tunnel ready to 
open, nearly fifty feet long, extending near thirty feet 
beyond the stockade, and dug with the rude implements 
we had at hand, consisting principally of half canteens 
and tin quart measures, such as every soldier carries 
with him to cook his coffee in. By means of our rope, 
one by one, on a dark, rainy night, we got into the well 
and swung into the tunnel, one ahead of the other, on 
our hands and knees, as if to play leap-frog. We then 
commenced to open the tunnel, which was rather a del- 
icate job. We were about six feet from the surface 
of the ground, and digging up into the open air at 
the further extremity of the tunnel was termed " open- 
ing the tunnel." This had to be performed with great 
care, first, for fear of being discovered, and second, 
there was danger of being smothered by the falling 
earth. I had heard of one case Avhere a tunnel was 
opened in the middle of a picket fire ; but it was told 
that the tunnellers, nothing daunted, sprang out through 
the fire ; the guard, believing their patron, the devil, 
had come to visit his Confederacy, ran away, leaving the 
prisoners to escape. We were not ambitious to "pass 
through the fire" in any such way, and were anxious 



ESCAPE AGAIN. 123 

only "to be let alone." We opened our tunnel after 
two hours or more of careful labor ; and I, by virtue 
of having commenced the tunnel, had the privilege of 
sticking my head into the outer air first, and was not 
much pleased to see, sitting crouching in the rain, not a 
dozen paces from our opening, an outer picket guard, 
at a large fire. Had he not been so intent on keeping 
comfortable, he must have seen us, as we, one by one, 
crawled stealthily into the thicket near at hand. Once, 
when a twig broke, he made a motion to look up, and 
I thought we were " gone up ; " but he merely stirred 
his fire, and resumed again his crouching position. As 
the last man came out, and, at a safe distance, we stood 
in whispered consultation, the hourly cry of the guard, 
"Twelve o'clock, and all is well," went round the 
stockade. We separated into parties of five, each to go 
in different directions, and, silently grasping each part- 
ing comrade's hand, we plunged into the gloomy pine 
forest, to make one effort for freedom. 

I had fully considered for weeks all the difficulties 
of an escape. I would not venture going down the 
Flint River to the Gulf on account of the river's being 
picketed, and, besides, from the fact that there were 
several large fortified places to pass on such a route. 
Again, when we arrived at the Gulf, what were the 
prospects of falling in with any of our forces ? After 
considering all the different points where I might reach 
our lines, I concluded there were less difficulties in the 
way of reacliing Sherman's forces at Marietta than any 



124 THE soldier's story. 

other : the circuitous travel of one hundred and twenty 
miles, under favorable circumstances, would carry us 
tlu'ough. The course I had marked out was very simple. 
If I tried to reach Sherman on the east side of Macon, 
flanking towards the sea-shore, I had many large places 
to pass, and such a course would throw us in contact 
with the many marauding forage parties which would 
naturally frequent that portion of the country. My 
plan was to go to the westward of Macon, in a north- 
westerly com'se, until the Chattahoochie River was 
reached, then following due north until the blue hills 
around Marietta could be seen, trust to fate and Sher- 
man for deliverance. 

These plans I had stated briefly to my comrades, who 
had adopted them, and looked upon me as a Moses, 
who was to lead them to the promised land. Travel- 
ling through the woods during the night, one of my 
four comrades got separated from the party. The next 
morning we reached overflowed portions of country, 
which indicated that we were near the Flint River. 
While debating as to the best course to pursue, one of 
my party declared he heard the hounds, which we soon 
found was an unpleasant fact. Not a moment was to 
be lost, and wading and swimming with almost frantic 
exertion soon brought us to the Flint River, the cur- 
rent of which, much swollen by freshets, was running 
swiftly. Getting upon logs, we floated with the stream 
for several hours, until we thought it sufficient to baffle 
the dogs from further pursuit. It was nearly noon, 



VAKIOUS PERILS. 125 

when, wet and exhausted, chilled with being so long 
in the water, we crawled upon the opposite shore, and 
were glad to run to get up a little warmth. As we 
emerged from the water, we found a sensation in the 
shape of an alligator, who lay just below us, like our 
floating^ logs. 

That day we travelled incessantly through swamps, 
and woods, and water, which overflowed all the low 
portions of country. The only food which we had be- 
tween us was a "pone" of johnny-cake, which we had 
starved ourselves to save in the prison. We had a 
pocket compass, which was intrusted to me, a small 
quantity of salt, and a butcher-knife, such as was issued 
to Massachusetts soldiers at Readville. Night came 
upon us, dark and rainy, and found us still travelling 
through the dark forest and wet swamps of the coun- 
try. About twelve o'clock, seeing a bright illumina- 
tion, which looked like a picket or a camp fire, just to 
the right, about a quarter of a mile from us, we went 
upon higher land to get an observation, and sat down 
on some fallen logs to consult in whispers as to what 
we had better do, about reconnoitring the light. Just 
then I was certain I heard something move in the log 
on which I sat. I sprang to my feet, with my club 
poised to strike — perhaps it was a bear. I challenged 
the log with the common expression among soldiers, 
"Are you Fed or Reb?" "Yankee," came the reply; 
and emerging from the log, which for the first time I 
observed was hollow, came a human form, which, after 



126 THE soldier's story. 

shaking itself like a water spaniel, asked, in tones 
strangely familiar, "Well, boys, what next?" "Going 
to tie your hands, old fellow," said I, " until daylight 
shows enough of you to see if you look honest." 
"Well, well !" laughed our mysterious prisoner; "why, 
don't you know Tonkinson ? " and sure enough it was 
our missing comrade. He had escaped the hounds like 
ourselves, by floating down the Flint River, and by a 
singular coincidence had fallen in with us again in the 
manner related : the hollow log he had selected for his 
hotel for the night. As he was a sharp fellow, and had 
a watch, he was quite a valuable addition to our party. 
When this surprise was well over, we held once more a 
consultation about the fire which had attracted our 
attention, before the incident narrated occurred. We 
concluded the safest and best way was to reconnoitre, 
in order to ascertain the nature of our neighbors, and 
see if danger was threatening us. We found it a camp 
fire near a tent, at which sat a solitary picket with his 
gun ; it was on a cross-road, stationed, I suppose, to in- 
tercept prisoners. One of our number got near enough 
to have knocked him over, had it been desirable. At 
another time that night we heard voices behind us, 
but concluded it was some picket tent, of wliich there 
were many scattered over that part of the country. 

About three o'clock that morning it stopped raining, 
and we lay down together under a tree, to get such 
rest as we best could. It was such lodging as we were 
accustomed to, and the three middle ones had some hopes 



AID FROM NEGROES. 127 

of keeping warm. At daylight, stiff, and more w(!ary 
than when we lay down, we resumed om- jom-ney 
through the wood. Our johnny-cake was eaten, and 
during the day we stopped only to pick a few berries, 
which grew in the woods. We got nothing else to eat 
during that day. Next day, about noon, we came upon 
some cattle browsing in the woods. We killed a little 
yearling heifer, one holding her by her horns whUe the 
other cut her throat with our sheath-knife. We cut the 
meat such as we desired and divided it among ourselves. 
The skin we cut into strips, with which, and with some 
of our clothes, we constructed rude haversacks, in which 
to carry our meat. We had no matches, or other 
method of kindling a fire, and of course ate our meat 
raw, with what little salt we had to season it. 

Thus, day by day, we travelled incessantly, keeping 
away from the white men of the country, but receiving 
help and direction from the negroes. Our first con- 
fidence in negro aid was not brought about by any pre- 
conceived ideas, but by accident. We discovered it 
was possible to trust them, to some extent, from the fol- 
lowing incident. One day we came accidentally upon 
some negroes working in the woods. We ran away 
quickly, thinking to get out of a bad scrape. One of 
them called after us, saying, "Don't be afraid, massa 
white man." Some idea that they might give us some- 
thing to eat caused me to turn back. I advanced cau- 
tiously, and speaking to an old, wliite-headed negro, I 
said, "Uncle, I suppose you know what kind of fellows 



128 THE soldiee's stoey. 

we are." "Well, I reckon," he replied, rolling np the 
whites of his eyes. " We are hungry, and want some- 
thing to eat sadly." "Well," said uncle, "you does 
look mighty kind o' lean. Step into de bushes while I 
peers round to see if we've got some hoe-cake ; " and 
off he trotted. We kept a good lookout to see that he 
did not betray us. But he came back with three pones, 
which he " 'clared to goodness " was " half they all had 
for de day." It was "right smart hard times in dem 
diggins." "Well, uncle," said I, "I suppose you know 
that Uncle Abe is coming down this way to set you 
all free when he gets the rebs licked." "Yes, yes," 
said the venerable negro, "I'se believe the day of jubilee 
is comin' ; but, 'pears to me, it's a long time ; looks 
like it wouldn't come in my time." 

Bidding him God speed, we went on our way with 
lighter hearts at the thought that there were friends in 
the midst of our enemies. Some of the old neoroes we 
met would shame the chivalry in jjoint of humanity and 
good shrewd practical sense. One of my comrades who 
had escaped for three or four days, before this time, 
told me he met a negro in the woods with a gun and 
dog, who told him he had lived in the swamps for 
several years, defying the white man. He offered to 
take him, provide for, and keep him all winter in 
his hut. He refused, tliinldng to be successful in get- 
ting into our lines. And I was afterwards infonned by 
some rebel officers that there was a negro who, to escape 
punishment, had run away from a plantation, and had 



PUESUED BY BLOODHOUNDS. 129 

subsisted in the swamps for a long time without being 
captured. 

We were entirely out of provisions on the eighth day 
of our escape, and in the morning had halted in some 
low land in the woods near a clearing to pick raspber- 
ries, which grew in abundance. Suddenly one of our 
number, noted in our travels for his quick hearing, 
declared the dogs were after us. According to previous 
agreement, when we were satisfied such was the case, 
we separated, each running in different dii'ections to 
give the dogs all the trouble we could, as possibly by 
this method some might escape. Nearer and nearer 
the dogs came. I jumped into a little brook which ran 
along through the low land, which was not wide enough 
to amount to much, as my clothes brushed the bushes 
on either side. But sometliing must be done, and that 
quickly. Seeing ahead of me a live oak, whose branches 
overhung the brook in which I was running, I sprang 
and caught the ends of the extending limbs, and with 
more strength than I had supposed myself to possess, 
quickly threw myself on the branch, crawled towards 
the trunk, and went up near the top of the tree out of 
sight, and had just got my breath when a pack of the 
dogs, smelling the bushes, howling and yelping in a 
fearful manner, and snuffing the air, and two men on 
horses following the pack, came directly under the tree. 
Suddenly dogs and men started off in another direction, 
and I was not sorry to see them going. I sat in the 
tree, and heard them when they captured my comrades. 
9 



130 THE soldier's STORY. 

Another pack of dogs came around, and passed just to 
the left of my tree, and I was satisfied that my tactics 
had baffled them. 

I had a good opportunity to observe, from my ele- 
vated position, the manner in which the horses followed 
the dogs. The men gave them a loose rein, and they 
followed the hounds, picking their way through the 
difficul; places in the wood, and neighing in a manner 
which would seem to indicate that they loved the sport. 
The sound of the dogs grew fainter and fainter in the 
distance, until I was left in the tree to my own reflec- 
tions undistm'bed. Here I was. I had been without 
sufficient sleep for eight nights and days, almost con- 
tinually drenched with rain. My hip was badly swollen 
vdth travelling; my feet bleeding, and clothes, by con- 
stant intercourse with brambles and cane-brake of the 
swamps, hung in picturesque tatters around me. Chilled, 
wet, and hungry, I got down from the ti-ee paralyzed 
with sitting with my leg over a branch, shook myself, 
hopped around to get up circulation, congratulated my- 
self warmly on being rather smarter than the rest of my 
crowd, and then sat down, taking out my note-book, 
in wliich I had kept a kind of a log, looked at my map, 
reckoned up the distance I supposed we had made per 
day, and the course we had been travelling, and judged 
myself from five to eight miles from the Chattahoochee 
River, near West Point, below Atlanta. Taking my 
course by the compass, I made a bee-line for the Chat- 
tahoochee Eiver, wliich I determined should settle for- 



ENCOUNTER WITH THE HOUNDS. 131 

ever the question between the dogs and myself. I 
afterwards ascertained that I had not varied five miles 
in my calculations, which was quite a feather, I thought, 
in my thinking cap. 

When the dogs came upon us, it was about nine 
o'clock, and when I resumed my journey, it was about 
three o'clock in the afternoon. I had not the slightest 
idea but that those following the dogs had abandoned 
further pursuit, and thus felt easy. I had not gone 
more than two miles before I heard the dogs on my 
track, bellowing and yelling like wolves. In vain I 
looked for a convenient method to get out of this 
scrape ; but the trees were pitch-pine, and had no 
branches nearer than twenty feet of the ground. In 
this extremity I saw just below me a Virginia fence, 
which I reached, and wrenching a stake from the fence 
for a club, I drew my coat sleeve down over my left 
hand, and thrust it out for the first dog which came up 
to bite at. He gave one jump at my extended hand, 
•and just at that time I let the stake come down upon 
his ugly head in a manner which made him give one 
prolonged yell, and rub his head among the leaves in a 
way which seemed to take his mind from the business 
in hand. The next blow embodied a compliment to 
the whole pack, who had come yelling and snapping 
around me ; and it laid one of them quivering just at 
the time the man following the dogs hove in sight, and 
sung out at the top of his voice, " Let go them thar 
dogs, you Yank, and get off the fence." I saw I waa 



132 THE soldier's story. 

cornered, yet T did not feel like being bit up just to oblige 
him. So I replied by laughing at him, at the same 
time keeping the dogs off by a circular motion of my 
club, remarking that I should be happy to oblige him, 
but couldn't see the point of letting the dogs take a bite 
apiece out of my flesh. I had noticed during this time 
that he had been cocking and holding towards me a 
rusty revolver, which I mistrusted, by the way he acted, 
was not loaded. 

After some parleying, he called the dogs off, remark- 
ing, "Well, I reckon yer are kind er tuckered eout, and 
I'll gin yer a httle spell at breathin' ; " at which I po- 
litely thanked him. After some conversation, in which 
he confessed that he'd " worn the seat of his trousers 
a'most off toting around after us," I learned from him 
that the dogs were put on our track about two hours 
after our escape, but, owing to the rainy weather, did 
not follow very fast, and were baffled for a long time at 
the Flint River, but that, by taking two packs of hounds 
on opposite sides of the river, they finally regained our 
trail. Not knowing we had a compass, they had been 
surprised at the almost bee line we had struck in the 
woods of a strange country. After repeated requests 
for me to '"git into the path," which I told him I had 
no inclination for until rested, I finally complied. 
"Wal, I'll be dod rot," said he, laughing, "you take 
it as cool as though you had caught me, instead of my 
catching you." He was anxious for me to go " afore " 
him. I preferred, however, to walk as near him as 



ATTEMPT AT STRATEGY. 133 

possible, in hopes that he might get off his guard, and 
I might have the pleasure of helping him from his sad- 
dle by a quick lift of his leg, and thus gain a horse to 
pursue my travels under more favorable circumstances. 
But no such chance occurred. He informed me that 
he smelt a " pretty big rat," and had his " eyes open 
tight." 

I was desperate, in spite of my seeming good nature, 
and went on the back track with as much reluctance as 
would a cat dragged by the tail over a carpet. I was 
once almost in the act of seizing his foot, when he 
caught my eye, and said, "No, you don't; yer needn't 
try yer Yankee tricks on me." Thereafter he kept me 
under range of his rusty revolver, and wouldn't allow 
me to come within ten feet of him. We soon reached 
the road and rejoined our comj)anions, who were waiting 
at a cross-road with their captors. 

I was informed, in my travels home, that the men 
employed in hunting us were all men who had been de- 
tailed from their regiments for that purpose. My cap- 
tor, the head hunter, told me that he had dcue nothing 
for eighteen years but hunt " niggers." For every es- 
caping Yankee caught, he shared equally with others 
thirty dollars. On excursions of the kind they some- 
times killed men, but that was seldom done unless they 
had whiskey in the crowd. He informed me that my 
being captured was mere accident, as he had been out 
to a settlement to forage for something to eat, when 
returning, he had run upon my trail, and followed it 



134 THE soldier's stoey. 

up. His dogs were, he said, the best trained of any in 
Georgia, and would follow "nothing but humans." 
He used me very well indeed, and during the journey 
back to the stockade shared with me the food he pur- 
chased, and invited me to sit with him at table. He 
also paid me a rather doubtful compliment by saying, 
"If yer wer a nigger, I wouldn't take three thousand 
dollars for yer." 

After a long, wearisome march backward of seventy- 
five miles, in which we had to keep up with horses and 
mules, we arrived again at the stockade headquarters. 
" Ah, py Got ! you is the tam Yankee who get away 
vunce before ! " was the first salutation of Wirz ; and 
then, turning to the hunter, he said, "Veil, did you 
make de togs pite 'im goot?" "No," was the response. 
"Veil, you must next time." "If I must, I will," said 
the hunter ; and I suspect he did, for I saw several, who 
were recaptured after that, frightfully bitten by the 
dogs. 

After taking my name and the detachment I belonged 
to in prison, he turned savagely around to me and said, 
"Veil, vat you tink I do mit you?" "I am in hopes," 
I replied, assuming the first position of a soldier, "you 
will put a ball and chain on, and anchor me out here 
somewhere where I can get fresh air." "Ah, you likes 
it, toes you? Sergeant, take dis man to de stockade." 
Back I went to my comrades, among whom my blanket 
and some other thin2:s left behind had almost bred a 
quarrel. They were quite surprised to see me, and 



BACK IX PRISON. 135 

were glad that I brought with me a log of pitch- 
pine wood, which, through the kindness of Sergeant 
Smith, I was permitted to bring into the prison. On 
the whole, though my clothes were torn in shreds, and 
I was scratched with briers and bitten by the dogs, my 
liealth was better generally than when I left the prison. 
It was not long before I was tunnelling again, with what 
result will be hereafter shown. 

Of those who escaped at the same time with myself, 
eight were captured the first morning after their escape, 
four got away some twenty miles, while the remaining 
three I have never since heard from. My unsuccessful 
escape gave me one advantage in prison ; it brought me 
a flattering notoriety, which led to my being made a 
confidant in any plans of escape formed by those who 
were knowing to my adventure. I was sure to be posted 
in all tunnelling going on, and therefore, in my opin- 
ion, increasing thereby my chances for successful es- 
cape. 



136 THE soldier's story. 



CHAPTER VII. 

Increase of Prisoners, generally destitute. — Greater Suffering from 
no previous Preparation. — Sad Cases of Deaths. — Rations growing 
worse. — Bad Cooking and Mixtures of Food. — Almost untold 
Misery. — Dying amid Filth and Wretchedness. — Preparing Bod- 
ies for Burial. — Horrible and Disgusting Scenes. — Increased 
Mortality. — Rebel Surgeons alarmed for their own Safety. — San- 
itary Measures undertaken. — Soon abandoned. — Scanty Supply 
of Medicines. — Advantages of a Shower-bath. — Gathering up the 
Dead. — Strategy to get outside the Prison as Stretcher-bearers. — 
Betrayal by supposed Spies. — Horrors at the Prison Gate in the 
Distribution of Medicines. — The Sick and Dying crowded and 
trampled upon. — Hundreds died uncared for. — Brutality in car- 
rying away the Dead. — The same Carts used for the Dead Bodies 
and in carrying Food to the Prison. 

DURING July prisoners continued to come into 
prison at the rate of about one thousand per week. 
These, with few exceptions, had previously been stripped 
of their overcoats and blankets, and, in many instances, 
had neither shoes, stockings, nor jackets — nothing but 
shirt and pantaloons to cover their nakedness. Num- 
bers of the inmates of the prison had been prisoners at 
Belle Island, and various other rebel prisons, for a year 
or more, and of course in that time had got no additions 
to their wardrobe, except such as their ingenuity could 
devise. It was common to see prisoners without hat, 



GREAT SUFFERLNG. 137 

sliirt, shoes, or pantaloons, their only covering being a 
pair of drawers. In this manner men became so burned 
by exposure to the sun, that their skins seemed tanned 
almost the color of sole-leather. The great mass who 
came into prison at this time had none of the advantages 
arising from gradual initiation, but were plunged into 
the depths of prison misery at once. Without the ad- 
vantages of experience, with limited means of comfort, 
they were thrown into prison to struggle and sicken 
despondently, and die. Some twenty of my company 
died during the month. B. W. Drake, a lad about 
eighteen years of age, was a victim to despondency and 
starvation. His delicate appetite rejected the coarse, 
unsalted, unpalatable food of the prison. Without 
any particular disease, he wasted away to a mere skel- 
eton, and finally died. Sergeant Kendal Pearson, of 
my company, also one of my mess, died during the 
month. He had been accustomed for many years to 
the moderate use of stimulating drinks. In prison, cut 
off from these, and with no proper nourishing food to 
take their place, he continually craved and thought of 
such things. In their place he would sometimes get a 
few red peppers, and make from them a hot drink, which 
seemed for a while to revive life and ambition within 
him ; but gradually his strength grew fainter and more 
feeble, till he died. 

In this manner they dropped off all over the prison ; 
and one day you would see a man cooking his food, the 
next day he would be dead. The eighty-fifth New York, 



138 THE soldier's story. 

who, it will be recollected, came into prison fit the 
same time with ourselves, was reduced in number by 
death over one half. Our rations continually grew 
worse, instead of better. For some of the last detach- 
ments formed in the prison, rice and beans were cooked, 
and in the change around from cooked to uncooked 
food, occasionally other detachments got the same ; but 
the food thus cooked was often fearfully dirty, caused 
by the beans and rice never being cleaned before cook- 
ing, and from the flies which gathered on and m all 
descriptions of eatables at that time of the year. The 
rebels said that iron wire Avas so scarce that they 
could not get it to construct sieves to cleanse the rice 
and beans. Had they possessed a particle of ingenuity 
or forethouglit, they might have winnowed them in the 
wind. The simple reason seemed to be for so great 
admixture of dirt, that they neidier cared nor thought 
the matter worth looking after. 

The whole prison was now a scene of misery which 
words cannot express, and which never was before, or 
ever again will be seen. At night you are awakened, 
your companion and friend d3'ing by your side, his last 
words of pathetic entreaty for food. " Don't tell mother 
how I died," said a dying comrade to me ; "it would break 
her heart to know what I had suffered. I am glad she 
cannot see how dreadful I look, she always loved to see 
me so clean." " Wash my hands and face," said an- 
other of my comrades, when he knew he must die ; "I 
cannot bear to die dirty ; " and as I washed his wan, 



STAEVATION, 139 

pinched face, and browned, thin hands, he smiled, 
spoke the name "mother," and died. His sensitive 
nature had ever shrunk from the vermin, filth, and dirt 
of the prison, so contrary to his habits of cleanliness 
and gentle breeding — he was anxious once more to be 
clean and die. Sad death-beds were all around. On 
the damp, hard ground, many a mother's darling, many 
a father's proud hope, breathed away a life which 
shut the light from some household — in some heart 
left sad throbbings. I am glad that no mother knows 
all the particulars of the miserable life, that preceded 
death in prison. I have been questioned by many 
mothers, who have lost a dear boy at Andersonville. 
If I seemed uncommunicative, and did not desire to 
Cvmverse with them, and shoidd these pages meet their 
eyes, let them be assured it was not because I did not 
sympathize with them, or that my heart was not full, 
but because I could not bear to pierce their hearts by 
detailing misery which would only bring them keener 
pangs of sorrow. 

There comes to my vision now, sitting in the soft 
twilight of this evening, listening to the village church 
bells, the form of one who died — miserably starved — at 
Anderson ville. When I first made his acquaintance, 
he was a clerk at headquarters of our commanding 
general. In prison our acquaintance ripened into 
friendship, which ended only with death. I never can 
forget how fond his accents were when he spoke, as he 
often did to me, of his village home ; described the 



140 THE soldier's STORY. 

winding slopes around the river's side, where he passed 
on his way to school or church ; and, " Sarg," said he, 
while liis intelligent eye would fire up with softened 
light, in which were mingled shadows of regret, "if it 
should please God to deliver me out of this misery, 1 
would try and do nearer as mother wished me." He 
told me how in the lonfj winter evening's he read to 
her while she peeled the red-cheeked apples before a 
blazing fire ; and then he would exclaim, " What a con- 
trast to this scene ! " Again he would look around him, 
and say, in those far-off, dreamy, dreary tones often 
heard in prison, " I wish I had the scraps she throws to 
our dog and chickens," or "I wish I had the straw and 
house our pig gets." When he died, his last, faint 
words were, as he placed his well-worn Bible in my 
hand, "I shall not be needing this, or anything to eat, 
much longer. I have tried to live by that book ; take 
it — may it prove to you, as it has to me, a last solace 
when every earthly hope has passed away." 

I opened the book, and read in low, hushed tones from 
Psalm xxxiv. ; and when I concluded the last verse, 
" The Lord redeemeth the soul of his servants ; and 
none of them that trust in Him shall be desolate," he 
looked up, saying nothing, but with a smile of gladness, 
as though that trusting spirit was his. Shortly after he 
became delirious, and died that afternoon — one more 
victim to Anderson ville. 

The common mode of preparing bodies for the grave 
was by tying their two large toes together, and folding 



INCREASED MORTALITY. 141 

tlieir hands one over the other. If the deceased had a 
hat, not needed by others, — which was seklom the 
case, — it was placed upon his face; otherwise the 
shrivelled cheeks, the unclosed eyes, and drooping jaw, 
as they were carried tlu'ough the prison, presented a 
pitiable sight, which I will not enlarge upon. 

It was when death became common as life ; when the 
prison, reeking with deathly vapors, was crowded to suf- 
focation with living victims ; when, side by side with 
life, death walked with the prisoner, — it was then that 
inhumanity shuddered at its own cruel malice. Even 
rebel surgeons, accustomed to seeing all our sufferings, 
protested at last, and uttered complaints to the authori- 
ties, which will bear out all the statements ever made 
of Andersonville suffering. Under the influence of 
protests from various rebel sources, men were set at 
work to enlarge the stockade, and again an effort was 
made to fill in the cesspools of the prison ; but these 
efforts to relieve our pitiful condition never seemed to 
be made in earnest, but were rather the result of fear 
that disease would spread into their own ranks outside 
the prison. These efforts, too, were soon abandoned, 
and matters relapsed into their old condition, growing 
worse and worse. " If Yellow Jack gets into this here 
place," said the rebel quartermaster to some of us, "it 
won't leave a grease spot on yer ; and I can't say there'll 
be many left if he don't." 

Medicines were issued in scanty quantities for a while, 
m July and August, but they seemed generally a played- 



142 THE soldier's story. 

out commodity in the Southern Confederacy. They 
were variously crude in kind, and small in quantity. 
Bloodroot was used as an astringent ; sumac berries 
were the only acid given for scurvy ; blackberry root 
was given as a medicine for diarrhoea, and camphor pills 
were the standard medicine for various diseases. Per- 
sonally I cared for none of these, as I ever placed but 
little faith in nostrums ; but thousands of wretches, in 
hopes of prolonging life a little longer, crawled, and 
were carried, to the prison entrance where medicines 
were issued. "The best medicine, after all," remarked 
a rebel surgeon, one day, " for these wretches, is food ;" 
and it was but little use to doctor starvation with herbs. 
But wholesome, nutritious food was more difficult to be 
obtained in prison than medicines, scarce as they were. 
I found one of the most efficacious remedies for the 
indescribable languor and weakness which result from 
insufficient food and scurvy to be cold-water shower- 
baths, taken morning, evening, and at noon. I usually 
showered myself by pouring cold water from my tin 
pail over my head and person while standing. Be- 
sides contributing to personal cleanliness, it had an 
agreeable, energizing action, without any of the depress- 
ing after effects produced by stimulating drinks. I do 
not think its influence in preserving life, in my case, can 
be much overstated. I practised daily bathing through 
all my imprisonment ; and though sometimes the disposi- 
tion induced by weakness and languor was greatly 
against exercise, yet I knew, from what I had seen, that 



SCARCITY OF WOOD. 143 

I must not give way if I hoped to live. Sometimes it 
seemed impossible for me to get to the " branch " to 
wash, and the water was often so filthy that it was not 
agreeable to use it even for bathing. Yet I always 
forced myself to creep to the brook and take a shower- 
bath. The effects were instantaneous, and sometimes 
seemed marvellous. I could always walk briskly back 
again up hill, and feel like a different man. 

Looking back over the past, I can hardly imagine 
how I managed to live from day to day. Wood was 
so scarce that it was almost impossible to cook our food 
when it was issued raw, — as it was most of the time, 
in about half of the squads of the prison, who were sup- 
posed to have cooking apparatus. Every remaining 
root, where trees had been, was dug out with the rude 
implements of the prison. Every stump had claimants, 
who dug around it, and protected their rights from in- 
vasions by force. This, for men in our condition, was 
hard and wearisome work, as our implements were 
mostly inadequate to the task, under favorable circum- 
stances, for stronger men. The stump and roots, after 
they were dug out, were cut up into small bits of three 
or four inches length and one inch thickness, — some- 
times in more minute pieces, — by means of a jackknife, 
and often with merely a piece of blade without a han- 
dle. Occasionally an axe would be smuggled into 
prison by some mysterious means, and its possessor be- 
came a kind of prince, who levied tax upon all the sur- 
rounding miserables who required its use. 



144 THE soldier's story. 

The dead were gathered up by detachments of pris- 
oners, and laid in rows outside the stockade. In order 
to get wood, there was great competition to fill the office 
of stretcher-bearer, as there was sometimes a chance for 
such to pick up wood on their return. Hence it passed 
into a saying, "I swapped off a dead man for some 
wood." A stretcher was made for carrying the sick 
and dead by fastening a blanket to two poles, provided 
for the purpose, and then rolling up the blanket on the 
poles until about the width of those of tlie ordinary 
construction. As I have elsewhere instanced in these 
pages, sometimes men feigned to be dead, and were 
carried out by their comrades, each of the parties de- 
riving advantage by the operation. Another sharp 
practice was, for four to carry out a dead man and only 
two return with the stretcher, which gave two a chance 
for escape and wood to the remaining ; thus conferring 
mutual benefits. Nothino- of this kind could be of Ioug: 
duration in practice, for by some method the Johnnies 
soon became posted in all our dodges. It was said, I 
know not with how much truth, every batch of prison- 
ers sent into the " pen " were accompanied by a spy iu 
U. S. blue, whom the others naturally trusted as a com- 
rade. He found out all the secrets of the squad and 
reported them to Wirz. This, doubtless, will account 
for much seeming treachery among our own men. It 
does not seem possible that any amount of misery could 
induce comrades to betray one another, even for food. 
I class traitors as follows : First, bounty jumpers ; 



HOREOES OF THE PRISON. 145 

second, enlisted prison convicts ; third, men who dug 
tunnels for the purpose of discovering them to the reb- 
els, gaining thereby an extra ration ; fourth, spies sent 
in by the authorities. 

Inside the stockade, near the gate, was often the 
scene of wildest hoiTor. Here would be gathered to- 
gether in the morning, waiting to pass out the gate to 
booths where medicmes were distributed, the sick, creep- 
ing, often, upon their hands and knees, and those too 
sick to creep borne by feeble, staggering companions. 
Here, also, would be gathered the stretcher-bearers with 
their burdens of dead ; all waiting, in a densely-packed 
throng of thousands, often in the rain, or sultry tropical 
sun, where not a breath of air stirred to revive the faint- 
ing. It was a rule, that no one, however sick, could 
be prescribed for or receive medicine unless first carried 
to the doctor. As it could never be ascertained on what 
day or hour medicines were given, day after day these 
suffering thousands would be turned away without med- 
icines, after waitin": for hours throu2:h the intense heat 
of the meridian sun. Often the sick, abandoned by 
those who carried them, would be left near the gate- 
way, in the intense heat, where no air could reach them, 
and thus uncared for, die. This arose not so much from 
the want of feeling of comrades as from their inabihty 
to care for them. Those who bore stretchers often fell 
fainting, and died in that throng of waiting misery. 
One day, in July, twenty men died in less than four 
10 



146 THE soldier's story. 

hours among the crowd of dead and dynig around the 
prison gate. 

The numbers who went to the hospital outside con-e- 
sponded with the numbers who died there daily. A 
police force of the prison dictated, with chibs, who were 
to pass first through the gate. The dead took the 
preference, followed by the sick on stretchers. Few 
of this throng got medicines. A great mass of the 
sick, rather than suffer the jamming and crowding, and 
rather than witness these dc})rcssing scenes of horror, 
remained, without trying to obtain what they came for ; 
since, to pass through this truly horrible ordeal, to go 
through or stand among this crowd of dead, sick, and 
dying, Mas worse than the sulFcring it was intended to 
alleviate. I eonsidered myself rather a tough specimen 
of a prisoner, but, after waiting, without success, for 
four successive mornings, to get out a conu'nde, I be- 
came confident, if I ])ersisted, I should be "carried out 
with my toes tied together" (which, in prison language, 
meant dead). Imagine two or three thousand men 
struggling, suffering, crowding together, to get through 
the gate, — all forms of death, disease, and sickness 
crowded and jammed together. Here the dead were 
crowding and jostling against the sick, ajid the sick, 
in their turn, jostling against and overtiu-ning the dead 
and dying. 

From first to last, the system of dispensing medicines 
was productive of more suffering than it icllevcd. At 
such gatherings the stench arising from the dead and 



DISREGARD OF THE DYING. 147 

dying was dreadful enouoh to ninko well men sick ; 
while the sight of men sick and dying, under the cir- 
cumstances described, was sufficient to depress the 
strongest heart with terror. The wan, pinched, famine- 
stricken, dirt-clotted countenance of the poor suflerers, 
the disgusting spectacle of dead men with unclosed eyes 
and drooping jaw, the eyes and face swarming with 
vermin, combined to make the scene one of the most 
intense horror ever gazed upon by mortal eyes. One 
of my battalion, a piivatc in (-omi)any G, was carried 
for two successive mornings to this gathering, and on 
the third died, lying in the hot sun, without an eilort 
being made by the surgeons and attendants to obtain 
shelter for him. Hundreds <lic'd in this uncared-for 
manner, which was of too fre<(ucnt occurrence to bo 
noticed or noted. One would naturally sup[)ose such 
spectacles enough to excite in hardened hearts emotions 
of pity and remorse ; but the chivalry gazed upon these 
daily, unmoved, often remarking upon them, "Good 
enough for the danuied Yanks." Neither were the 
dead and dying exempt from their abuse. J have 
seen a dying man rudely tumbled from (lie sticlcJicr 
on which he lay, without the slightest hee(l bcini; given 
to his pleading entreaties for })ity. 

On one of the mornings when I was carrying the 
sick, I saw an emaciated, sick man u[)<)n a str(!tcher; 
his shrunken face and hands were covered with filth, 
and begrimed with the pitch-] )Ine smoke of the prison ; 
he had no clothing upon his wasted body save a pair 



148 THE soldier's story. 

of army drawers, which had once been white ; other- 
wise diarrhoea had rendered his condition too dreadful 
to be described to ears polite, or even to be gazed upon. 
One of the prison officers at that time crowded through 
the throng of the sick and the dead : while doing so, 
he forcibly pushed against this poor creature, who was 
uttering plaintive moans and cries for mercy, to which 
no heed was given. In the scramble which followed, 
the dying man was overturned, and, as he lay gasping 
in his last trembling agonies, the same officer or at- 
tendant passed again that way, and rudely thrust him 
with his foot from his path, saying, " One more Yank's 
gone to the devil." Sitting this evening before the 
crackling blaze of a New England's Avinter fire, and 
cheered by civilized comforts, I cannot repress a chill 
of horror and cree^Ding sensations of shivering terror at 
its mere remembrance. 

Such occurrences were too much a " matter of course " 
to be noticed, and I only instance this solitary, unknown 
dying man, among the suffi^ring thousands of the prison 
pen, as an example of the fiendish hate and malice 
which pursued these patriots of the Union even when 
the doors of death were closed upon their starved, 
unburied forms ! 

Carrying away the dead to their final rest was but a 
horror in keeping with the scenes described, and a 
fitting climax to the life of misery which ended in the 
prison. The dead that gathered during the day were 
placed in what was known as tlie dead house, — a rude 



TREATMENT OF THE DEAD. 149 

shed frame, covered with bushes. From thence, each 
morning, they were taken, thrown upon a cart drawn 
by three mules, with a negro driver seated upon the 
middle one, over the ungraded field to the place of 
interment. The bodies were usually thrown, one upon 
the other, as high as could be reached ; often the head, 
shoulders, and arms of one or more of the bodies pro- 
trudins: over the side and from the rear of the cart, or 
from under the dead piled above them, — the dropping 
jaw, the swaying head, undulating with each motion 
of the cart, the whole mass of bodies jolting and sway- 
ing, as a comrade expressed it, " like so much soft 
soap." It was said that from these carts maggots and 
vermin of various kinds could be scooped, after such an 
excursion, by the handful. In these same carts our 
rations were brought to us, shovelled in where the 
dead bodies had lain ; and with flies, which gather, in 
a climate like Georgia, upon all eatables exposed, gave 
us food, when cooked, well mixed with everything 
which could be offensive and disagreeable. Death 
in prison, under such circumstances, was not always 
looked forward to with loathing or terror, — not always 
preceded by acute, though always with great suffering, 
— but was often hailed with tearful, trembling joy, as 
a message of freedom spoken to imprisoned men. 



150 THE soldier's STORY. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

Robberies in Prison. — Means taken to punish such Acts. — A Char- 
acter. — Big Peter, a Canadian. — His Administration of Justice 
on Offenders. — Becomes a Ruling Power. — Missing Men and 
Rebel Vengeance. — Murders of Prisoners by Thieves. — A Police 
Force organized. — Courts established. — Trials of accused Mur- 
derers. — Conviction and Execution. — The Gang of Murderers, 
Tliieves, and Bounty Jumpers broken up. — A Slight Tribute to 
Wirz, as only the Tool of Others. — Character of the Prison 
Police. — Not all Good Effects. — A Terror to the Good as well 
as Bad. — Sometimes the Instruments of Rebels. 

FROM the time we arrived in prison we were con- 
tinually troubled and annoyed by having our . 
scanty clothes, blankets, and cooking utensils stolen 
from us. There were so many temptations, and so few 
restrictions thrown in the way of the perpetration of 
theft, that it became an evil, at last, that must be 
checked. Stealing blankets from boys unaccustomed 
to hardships was downright murder ; for, if no one 
extended the corner of his blanket to protect the 
unfortunate from the chill dews of evening and from 
the frequent rains, deprived thus suddenly, he was sure 
to sicken and die. Stealing cooking utensils reduced 
unfortunates, thus deprived, to the necessity often of 
eating their scanty rations without cooking, or of steal- 



PUNISHMENT OF ROBBEES. 151 

ing or begging from others. Begging was as much out 
of fashion and good standing in prison as a,ny place. 

It was rumored around camp, from time to time, that 
raiders and flankers were organized for the perpetration 
of outrages, and of protecting themselves against the 
punishment of such acts. Although there was no defi- 
nite organization among us, it was agreed upon that 
these villains should be promptly dealt Avith ; that when 
any of the Plymouth prisoners could identify a "raider," 
or was attacked or robbed by one of them, he was to 
call out loudly " Plymouth ! " when every one of the 
boys within hearing were to turn out to his assistance. 
In accordance with this agreement, we heard one morn- 
ing the rallying cry, and captured a fellow who was 
caught in the act of stealing a blanket. The boys gath- 
ered around him, not knowing what to do with the 
Tartar now that they had caught one. He sat gnash- 
ing his teeth, threatening his captors with the vengeance 
of a band, which he said was formed for mutual thiev- 
ing, if they should injure or inflict punishment upon 
him. Feeling some reluctance to proceeding against 
him, they were about to release him without punish- 
ment, otherwise than a few kicks, when a corporal of 
Company G, second Massachusetts heavy artillery, fa- 
miliarly known in prison as " Big Peter," came into the 
crowd, and taking the raider fearlessly in hand, inflicted 
summary punishment upon him by shaving half of his 
head and face, giving no heed to the desperado's savage 
gnashing of teeth and threats of vengeance, except to 



153 THE soldier's story. 

thump his head at each beginning and repetition of 
them. After dealing out justice in this off-hand man- 
ner, and an administrative reminder (in the rear) from 
a pair of tlie heaviest of cowhides, the thief was released, 
with admonitions to sin no more. 

This, I believe, was the first instance of formal pun- 
ishment for such misdemeanors ; and thereafter Big Pete, 
by virtue of these services, became the terror of evil- 
doers. Pete exhibited so much coui'age at this time, 
and subsequently so much good sense and natural judg- 
ment, that he gradually became the administrative 
power for the punishment of offences committed. He 
performed for \is the services of shaving, and in a digni- 
fied, impartial manner gave the culprit a trial, — hearing 
the statements of both sides before pronouncing judg- 
ment and inflicting punishment, both of which, however, 
were often condensed into the last act. Few exceptions 
were taken to his rulings, for who could object to the 
persuasive arguments of one who wore such heavy 
boots ? 

The incident narrated was the beginning of a power 
in camp to punish offenders, which finally provided us 
with an effective police organization. Pete w^as an 
uneducated Canadian — a man of gigantic stature and 
great physical strength, of an indomitable will, great 
good nature, and with innate ideas of justice, in the 
carrying out of which, he was as inflexible as iron. A 
blow from his fist was like that from a sledge-hammer, 
and from first to last he maintained so great a supremacy 



MURDERS IN PRISON. 153 

in camp, that no description of the prison at that time 
would be complete without a sketch of him. His trials 
were often intensely grotesque and amusing to specta- 
tors, but not generally so to the culprit. I took pains 
to follow some of his trials, and I must say, in justice, I 
never knew him to make a wrong decision, though 
baffled in his purpose by ingenious lies. Through all 
the intricate lies, he had a talent for detecting them 
and sifting out the truth. Thus, at last, by common 
consent, if any one had complaints to make, he carried 
them to the " shebang " of Big Peter. He either went 
himself, or sent some of his adherents, who returned 
with the accused ; witnesses were then summoned and 
punishments dispensed. Justice was being dealt out in 
this manner, when one morning it was announced — 
and to our sorrow we found it carried into practice — 
that our rations were to be stopped on account of men 
being missing from the stockade — supposed by the rebel 
authorities to have escaped by means of tunnels. In- 
vestigation led to no new discoveries, and after twenty- 
four hours' extra starvation, they were again issued as 
before, it being impossible to discover the missing men, 
or any modes by which they could have escaped. 

About this time, the raiders, under the leadership of 
one Mosby, became exceedingly bold, attacked new 
comers in open daylight, robbing them of blankets, 
watches, money, and other property of value. Rumors 
of frightful import were circulated through the camp of 
men murdered for their blankets and money. After 



154 THE soldier's story. 

this, more men were missing at the morning roll-call, 
of whom there could be no reasonable account given. 
Under Big Peter a company was organized, armed 
with clubs, who proceeded to the shelter formerly 
occupied by the missing men. Inquii'ies being made 
among those who were li\dng near, no information 
could be obtained, othenvise than the fact that outcries 
were heard during the night, and that there was a 
scuflfle near ; but scenes of disorder being common 
during the night, they had taken but little notice of 
them, since, as peaceable men, they wislied to avoid all 
wrangling. Notlung at first could be found, in the 
shelter formerly occujaied by these men, to excite sus- 
picion. Most of the crowd had dispersed, when one of 
the men, on his hands and knees at the entrance, looking 
down into the grave-like hole which formed the princi- 
pal part of the abandoned dwelling-place, saw a piece 
of blue cloth, partially covered with dirt. Seeing in 
this the element of a patch for the repairing of his 
shattered wardrobe, he pulled at it, and found it fas- 
tened in the ground. This excited his curiosity, also Ids 
desh'e for possession ; and he began to dig and puU, 
until further progress was arrested, and lie started back 
with horror at the imexpected appearance of a human 
hand. A crowd gathered around, and speedily a dead 
man was unearthed, whose throat had been cut in a 
shocking manner, and his head bruised by a terribhj 
blow. In the same space, beneath liim, was found 
another victim, with his throat cut. The news of these 



POLICE FORCES ORGANIZED. 155 

horrible murders spread tlirougli the prison, as if by 
telegi'aph, and a large crowd soon assembled around the 
scene of these atrocities. The police proceeded to the 
shelter of several notorious thieves and bad characters 
of the prison, and arrested them. Through information, 
or clew gained of one of these, they were induced to dig 
in the shelter of some of those arrested, which resulted 
m the discovery of money, watches, cS;c., in many cases 
identified as the property of the murdered men. 

Kapidly after the perpetration of these cold-blooded 
atrocities, strong police forces were formed under 
Big Peter as chief of police. Afterwards a judge- 
ship was established in prison, and there were two 
regular practising attorneys, who took fees of Indian 
meal, beans, and small currency in payment for services 
rendered; and sometimes, it was said, bribed the judge 
and chief of police. In the case of Staunton, a big brute, 
and tool of the rebels, who killed a man, as mentioned 
in preceding pages, it was rumored that his money, 
procured by dicker with prisoners, obtained him a mild 
sentence and punishment. Not to digress further, the 
supposed murderers, some fifteen in number, were 
arrested, and after gaining suflficient evidence, consent 
was obtained of the prison authorities for their trial. 
Besides this was obtained the privilege of conducting 
the trial under guard, in a building outside the prison. 
The accused were also held in custody through the 
kindness of Wirz, the commandant. A jury of men 
was empanelled, composed of prisoners just captured, 



156 THE soldier's story. 

who had never been in the prison, and who, therefore, 
could not have formed prejudices on either side. The 
trial lasted through a number of weeks. Competent 
men were ajipointed to defend the prisoners by the 
authorities. An able lawyer, an officer of the rebel 
g lard, conducted the defence, afterwards stating to me 
that he had no doubt of the guilt of those who suiFered 
punishment. The prosecution was conducted by men 
selected from among the prisoners. Six of these men 
were pronounced by a jury guilty of murder. 

On the 12th of the month, Captain Wirz, accom- 
panied by a guard, brought the prisoners into the stock- 
ade, where, on the south side, near the gate, and the 
scene of the murder, a gallows had been erected. Here 
he turned the offenders over to the prison police, Avith a 
short speech, in which he stated that they had been 
impartially tried and found guilty of atrocious murders, 
and that he left their punishment in the hands of the 
prisoners of the stockade. He then turned, and fol- 
lowed by liis guai*d, left the prison. The police formed, 
in two ranks, a hollow square around the gallows ; 
the 1 jpes were arranged, and the guilty men ascended 
the scaffold steps. Up to this time the murderers did 
not seem to view the proceedings in a serious light, 
but rather as a joke. Leave was then given for them 
to speak, which they did, protesting their innocence, 
one or two calling upon their companions to do their 
duty, which, properly interpreted, meant that they 
wished to be rescued from the police. The ropes were 



EXECUTION OF MUEDEKERS. 157 

adjusted about their necks, the bags were drawn over 
theu* faces, their hands pinioned, a hushed silence 
reigned in the camp, the drop fell, and five of the 
prisoners hung by their necks, swaying in the air; the 
sixth, nearest to the prison gate, sprang at the time, or 
before the drop fell, broke the rope about his neck, 
gained his feet, forced his way through the police and 
crowd, cleared his hands, ran swiftly, was pursued, 
beaten over the head, and recaptured, when the rope 
M^as again adjusted, his protestations of innocence were 
unheeded, and he was pushed from the drop, and hung 
with his comrades in guilt. Thus ended the lesson of 
retribution that put a stop to murders in prison, and 
broke up a gang of bounty-jumping desperadoes. 

Let me here record, in justice to a man who has 
since met a similar fate, in retribution for crimes com- 
mitted against Union prisoners, that I and many others 
of the prison were grateful to Henry Wirz for the 
privilege afforded us, to enable us to give the accused a 
fair, impartial trial. I have purposely avoided, in these 
pages, heaping unnecessary odium upon the head of 
one who, though guilty, I have good reasons to suppose 
was only the executive of a system devised by men 
liigh in rebel authority, and from whose orders no 
inferior could deviate. There never was a hanging 
conducted in a more orderly manner. There was no 
clamor of voices, but in silence and decorum befitting 
such a scene, thirty thousand men were its witnesses. 
Thenceforward raiding and flanking were of rare oc- 



158 THE soldier's story. 

currence, and the police became one of the establish 
ments of the prison. That the police did much to punish 
offenders and preserve order, cannot be denied. They 
were mostly of the class denominated "roughs," selected 
for their physical rather than mental qualifications, and 
in some instances became a greater evil than that 
which they were instituted to correct. They levied 
tax upon all trading stands and occupations in the 
prison, cudgelled men over the head for small faults, 
and whipped them upon the bare back, with a cat of 
nine tails, most of whom, however, deserved the pun- 
ishments inflicted. Yet they would not tolerate any in- 
justice done by others than themselves, unless they were 
well paid for not arresting offenders. Reserving to 
themselves the right (?) of doing injustice and com- 
mitting abuses, they governed the camp and corrected 
all other abuses but their own. 

I am sorry to record, that in the Florence (S. C.) 
military prison, when S. was acting chief of police, 
this kind of police force became for a while degraded 
tools in the hands of the rebels, and whipped men at 
their command upon the bare back for digging tunnels, 
&c., for wliich dirty service they were rewarded with 
extra rations. I have entered thus particularly into 
details which were needful that the general reader 
should have, that he may realize in some degree the 
position of a prisoner at Anderson ville, and to show that 
anything originally devised for our welfare might be 
perverted to our misery. 



NEGRO PRISONERS. 150 



CHAPTER IX. 

Negro Prisoners. — Barbarous Amputations. — None but the Wounded 
made Prisoners. — Their cleanly Habits. — Treatment. — Major 
Bogle. — Bad Treatment of him as an Officer of Negro Troops. — 
A Misunderstanding. — Andersonville a Prison for Privates, and 
not Officers. — A great Project to break from Prison. — Two Thou- 
sand engaged in it. — The Project betrayed when nearly com- 
pleted. — Despondency at the Result. — Courage renewed prov- 
identially. — Addition to the Stockade. — Much short Comfort from 
the Enlargement. — A new Stock of Fuel soon exhausted. — Dis- 
honorable Offers to Prisoners generally spurned by starving Men. — 
Fidelity under extraordinary Circumstances. — Instances cited. — 
Heroic Men. — New Methods of Operation. — These also spurned. 
— Various E\'idences of Devotion to Country. 

T was in July that I first noticed negro prisoners 
among us, though they were, doubtless, there pre- 
vious to that time. Scarcely any of them but were 
victims of atrocious amputations performed by rebel 
surgeons. It was said that none of the prisoners were 
captured except the wounded. Those in the prison 
were mostly New England men. Some of them had 
been captured at the charge on Fort Wagner, when 
Colonel Shaw was killed, and at the battle of Olustee, 
Florida. I observed in the negro prisoners a commen- 
dable trait of cleanliness. Indeed, I may safely say, 
their clothes were, on an average, cleaner and better 



160 THE soldier's STORY. 

patched than those of other prisoners of the stockade. 
Through exposure to the sun and ram, they were much 
blacker than the common southern negroes, and many 
were the exclamations of surprise among the guard at 
this fact. "The blackest niggers I ever saw," was the 
common expression on seeing them. I have said the 
negroes were mostly wounded and mutdated ; when 
there had been a case of amputation, it had been per- 
formed in such a manner as to twist and distort the limb 
out of shape. When a negro was placed in a squad 
among white men, it was usually accompanied with the 
injunction, addressed to the sergeant of the squad, 
" ]\Iake the d — d nigger work for and wait upon you : if 
he does not, lick him, or report liim to me, and I will." 
I never knew an instance, however, where a sergeant 
required of the black any service not usually allotted to 
others, and that in drawing and distributing rations. 

Understanding that there was a major of colored 
troops in prison, I hunted him up, and found ]Major 
Archibald Bogle, who was formerly, I believe, a Lieu- 
tenant in the 17th Mass. infantry. He was captured at 
Olustee, after being severely wounded in several pla(!es. 
He informed me that he formerly lived in Melrose, 
Mass. Since he came into the pen, he had been re- 
fused all medical and surgical treatment, though the 
prisoners detailed as hospital stewards had covertly 
afforded him aid, and dressed his wounds. He wore 
his uniform, and freely declared himself an officer of 
negro troops — a fact which all officers of negroes were 



OFFICERS OF COLORED SOLDIERS. 161 

not willing to own, by reason of the hard treatment 
received therefor from the rebels. His was an instance 
of the fact that a true gentleman remains the same 
amidst the most squalid misery and accumulated misfor- 
tunes. His intercourse with others was dignified, cour- 
teous, and urbane, as if in command of his regiment. 
There were many in prison, as there always has been 
in our army, who professed to despise negro troops, 
and have a contempt for their officers. Major Bogle 
was, at one time, I was informed, compelled to mess 
with his negroes ; yet he always maintained his gentle- 
manly bearing and his self-respect, and commanded the 
respect of others amid all the accumulated misery of the 
"prison pen." Such were my impressions of Major 
Bogle. 

Many loose statements have been made in print indi- 
cating that officers were as common among prisoners 
at Andersonville as enlisted men. With the exception 
of Major Bogle, there were no commissioned officers 
intentionally placed in Andersonville. Others were 
there by their own act ; but the prison was intended for 
enlisted men only. At any time an officer of white 
troops could be sent to Macon, or some other officers' 
prison, by merely making a plain statement of facts 
which looked plausible. So much is required to be 
said, as there seems to be a great misunderstanding in 
relation to this matter ; and it is my desire to write 
such a description of the prison that those who were 
prisoners at the time with myself will be the ones most 
11 



162 THE soldier's stort. 

ready to testify to the truth of these pictures, crudely 
drawn with pen and ink. Major Bogle, at one time, 
was engaged in a tunnelling operation, in which he 
plotted to release all the prisoners of the stockade. It 
failed through the treason of some one in the secret, 
though it came near being a success. About the time 
I became acquainted with him, an extensive plot was 
formed to break the stockade. Over two thousand men 
were pledged to risk their lives upon an effort to liber- 
ate the prisoners of the stockade. Here seemed the 
choice before us, to die without an effort, amid all the 
misery of the prison pen, or to die with our hands up- 
lifted to strike one blow at our enemies, before death, 
in an attempt to liberate ourselves and starving com- 
rades. To no reasonable man did there appear at that 
time to be any hope for life but in that manner. I 
went into the project, I am willing to confess at this 
day, having full confidence in our ability to achieve the 
desired result, and with a feeling that it was better to 
die in such an attempt than to die a miserable, loath- 
some death by gradual starvation. 

Acting in concert, we set ourselves at work, and dug 
tunnels up to the stockade ; then the tunnel branched 
off at right angles, running parallel with the stockade, 
a shoulder of earth being left as a temporary support, 
so that when a rush was made against the walls from 
the outside, it would be thrown down in the places thus 
mined. In this manner three portions of the stockade 
walls were undermined — at least, I have reason to 



A DESPERATE PLOT TO ESCAPE. 163 

suppose so, although I was engaged in digging and en- 
gineering on but one of them. Our plans were as 
follows : One detachment of prisoners was to break 
tlu'ough on the south side, near the gate, and capture 
the reserve of the guard ; another to break through on 
the north side, and, making a circuit of the stockade, 
capture the guard thereon ; another party, breaking 
through on the south-west side, near the gate, was to 
capture the rebel artillery near headquarters, and use it 
according to circumstances, and make such capture of 
rebel officers as was possible ; while prisoners outside, 
under detail, were to cut the telegraph wires. This 
achieved, prisoners were to be liberated, rations equally 
distributed, the cars seized, ammunition and arms placed 
in the hands of " the organization," and then, raiding 
through the rebel country, seize upon horses and other 
modes of transportation, and effect an escape to the 
Gulf. Such were our plans generally. 

All was pronounced ready for the grand assault, and 
we were waiting with trembling expectancy, when a 
proclamation was read in prison, and posted in conspic- 
uous places, stating that such a plan was known to be 
organized, and the commandant of the prison had full 
knowledge of all its details, even to the names of those 
concerned ; and that, if we persisted in carrying it out, 
there would be great bloodshed, which he wished to 
avert. Such, in substance, was a proclamation signed 
by Henry Wirz. We had been betrayed by one who, 
we supposed, from every motive of interest, would keep 



164 THE soldier's story. 

the secret. Artillery was posted at various points, with 
men in position to use it : twice shots were fired over 
the heads of prisoners in crowds, while white flags were 
j)laced all over the prison, as ranges for their artillerists. 
Thus ended the best-conceived plan for liberating the 
j)risoners en masse during my imprisonment, and proved 
the assertion frequently made among the Kentucky 
boys, that "Everything in the Confederacy was dreflTul 
onsartain, and liable to bust." 

After the repeated failure of long-cherished and hard- 
worked plans, which were to give liberty or death to 
the projectors, for once I became despondent and doubt- 
ing, falling away from faith in ever getting out of prison 
otherwise than by dying. Dark clouds of despau* 
gathered around me, and followed my feeble footsteps. 
Though I knew I was bringing ujson myself the very 
fate I had been so long trying to avert ; knew that 
such moods were productive of none but evil to him 
who entertained them ; yet, for a time, it seemed im- 
possible for me to rally from or shake them off. In this 
wretched condition of mind — prolific of none but per- 
nicious results — I was, one day, creeping down the 
slippery pathway of the hill, which led to the brook- 
side. Everything around me looked foreboding ; the 
dying men, who always encircled tlie quagmire of the 
prison, sti-etched out their withered hands in supplica- 
tion for food, which I had no power to give ; the dead, 
lying with unclosed eyes and dirt-stained, pallid faces, 
brought back to my heart, with startling force, the 



DESPONDENCY AND HOPE. 165 

question, How soon shall I, like these, lie uncared for, 
dead, starved, after a painful Hfe without a gleam of hope ? 
The thought was maddening ; reason was tottering ; and, 
full of half-formed, desperate thoughts and gloomy re- 
solves of ending at once that which seemed must be 
ended there in long and torturing misery by starvation, 
I saw lying at my feet a bit of waste paper. I said 
within myself. If there is anything on that paper — one 
word of hope — I'll take courage and live ; otherwise — 
and here I clutched the paper, when the first words that 
caught my eye were these : — 

" Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take ; 

The clouds ye so much dread 

Are big with mercy, and will break 

With blessings on your head ! " 

It was a portion of the leaf of an old hymn book. 
I never saw the hymn before nor since, and I may not 
have quoted it exactly; yet, had an angel from heaven 
assured me of my ultimate release from rebel hands, I 
could not, thereafter, have been more confident of my 
destiny. Never, after that, did my faith waver even for 
an instant. At another time, one of my companions, 
seeking for encouragement in his despondency, placed, 
at random, his finger between the leaves of his Bible ; 
it rested upon the twelfth verse of the one hundred and 
fortieth Psalm : " I know that the Lord will maintain 
the cause of the afflicted and the right of the poor." 
Of course hope always construed such omens on our 



166 THE soldier's story. 

side to our advantage. Thus it was that the prisoner 
clung to every straw of hope. At various times, when 
I first went into prison, I had jocosely taken little bets 
of suppers, dinners, &c., as to the duration of our im- 
prisonment, but always lost them, through the death 
of the other party. 

During the last of July, or first of August, an addi- 
tion was made to the stockade. This gave to the thirty- 
five thousand crowded into the space of ten acres more 
room by ten additional acres. The opening of the 
new stockade, as it was usually termed, was an event 
which contributed to the comfort of the prisoners in 
various ways. It gave them more wood, by the tear- 
ing down of the stockade walls, which had separated 
the new enclosure from the old, furnishing for a time a 
good supply. But, as the majority in prison had no 
means of splitting and cutting up the huge logs which 
formed the stockade walls, nor the instruments for dig- 
ging up or cutting down the huge timbers, the bottoms 
of which had been solidly fixed into the ground some 
eight feet, and as but a limited number of the thirty 
thousand men could work at such employment at a 
time, the supply fell into the hands of a few who had 
the strength and implements to do the work. The 
sto^k, however, was soon exhausted, and wood became 
almost as scarce as ever. There were yet in the new 
stockade roots and stumps, which gave, for a while, to 
those who had the courage and strength to dig in the 
hot sun, a supply. But the larger number had neither 



DISHONORABLE PROPOSALS. 167 

strength, courage, nor the implements, other than then* 
fingers, to dig with. 

The reader, in considering our circumstances, must 
always remember that the great majority of the impris- 
oned thousands had become so emaciated and weak by 
continual exposure and starvation as to be scarcely able 
to take advantage of any circumstance like the fore- 
going in their favor. There were always a few, per- 
haps one in two hundred, who formed an exception to 
the great mass of sufferers. A few who had axes or 
large wedges were able, in some cases, to lay in a large 
supply of wood, but, as want increased, these did not 
long retain possession. The police, vigilant in all mat- 
ters of general interest to themselves, caused those thus 
stocked to divide with the suffering thousands arotmd 
them, taking; a good share for their own trouble. With 
all the additional acres added to the prison grounds, we 
were still crow^ded for room ; and if I have not contin- 
ually impressed the reader with our miserably cramped 
condition, it was because one statement of such facts 
seemed sufficient. For two or three weeks there was 
a better supply of wood, but soon it was as scarce as 
ever. 

In spite of the sufferings endured, which I have but 
feebly portrayed in the preceding pages, any offered 
relief that involved dishonor to themselves, or reflected 
discredit on our government, was not favorably received 
by the great mass of suffering men. At one time, 
during a period of most intense suffering, rebels 



168 THE soldier's story. 

from Macon and other large places came into the 
stockade, offering tempting inducements for prisoners 
to go with them, and work, during their imprisonment, 
at their trades. Shoemakers, carpenters, blacksmiths, 
and coopers were offered good food, clothes, and liberal 
compensation in greenbacks. Those who made this 
proposition were actually mobbed, and forced to leave 
the prison, by men who were on the brink of starvation, 
who had partaken of but one scanty meal during forty- 
eight hours. I observed, from time to time, in the 
different prisons where propositions were made of this 
nature, that a time was always selected when we were 
suffering the most for want of food. It was possible — 
and the fact speaks volumes in favor of the prisoners' 
fidelity to the government — they kne'vy that at any 
other time such propositions would be rejected with 
contempt. The common sentiment among prisoners 
was, that it was as bad to assume the places of men 
who would thus be enabled to take muskets, as to use 
up arms themselves against their country. 

David Robinson was a middle-aged man, a mechanic 
of Massachusetts, who had left a family at home de- 
pendent upon him for support, to fight the battles of 
the country. His son, a lad of eighteen years, a fine, 
manly fellow as ever gladdened a father's heart, had 
followed in his footsteps. When the proposition came 
to go out to work, and thus save the life of himself and 
son, he replied, "No ! I know for what I enlisted, and 
have been fighting for ; the boy and I will die, but we 



GEEAT HEROISM. 160 

can never desert the cause." The boy died, in what 
manner I shall relate in coming pages. Tlie father, 
broken in heart and health, lives to mourn his son. 
Yet he was only a New England mechanic, whom the 
terrors of death could not seduce from his country's 
cause. At another time the proposition was made to 
Corporal Gibson, of my company, an old man, who 
afterwards died at Charleston. The answer was heroic : 
" You can starve my body, but shall not stain my soul 
with treason ! " Such were the men who died by thou- 
sands, and filled the begrudged graves dug by relent- 
less foes. 

Dui'ing July and August efforts were persistently 
made by men among us, backed by the rebels, to get 
up a petition representing our condition, and asking 
our government to take action for our release. This 
was, in my opinion, at the time, and also that of a 
great majority in the prison, but an effort of the rebels 
to make the misery inflicted by themselves subservient 
to their own base purposes of forcing our government 
to their own terms. In prison, as elsewhere, there was 
a diversity of opinion, yet the almost imanimous voice 
was against forwarding such a petition. Sergeant 
Kellogg, I believe it was, who was captured at Plym- 
outh, was asked to sign it. " No," he replied ; " our 
government will do what is right. These are our ene- 
mies, trying to benefit their cause, not yours." Such 
was the language of starving patriots, and such was 
the force of words fitly spoken, that they were repeated 



170 THE soldier's STORY. 

through the prison in reply to those who asked for 
signatures. Thus,, often sterhng words counteracted 
evil influences ! 

The rebels have since made a virtue of having for- 
warded, through kindred tools, such a petition. They 
could look on and see the prisoner starve, and rejoice 
thereat, without lifting a helping hand, and the next 
moment forward a petition to our government, setting 
forth the misery which they were inflicting ! Towards 
those of our own numbers who were forced by hunger 
to be their tools, we should be charitable, yet I believe 
it to be a fact, that those who signed that petition, 
were those who were suffering least in prison, — bounty- 
jumpers and deluded men, — men not in sympathy 
with the cause. The great mass repudiated the peti- 
tion, and to-day, when the old flag floats over every 
foot of land once desecrated by rebels, I feel a thrill of 
pleasure, — melancholy though it be, — in contemplat- 
ing those dark days when men starved and dying would 
not swerve from the right, that the cause for which 
they died has triumphed. And in coming days, the 
noblest monuments of sacrifices made for the nation's 
safety shall be those patriots' graves ! 

The more the prisoners were abused, the more fondly 
did their thoughts turn to the old flag, undei which they 
had fought, and which was the symbol of happiness and 
plenty at home. " We have confidence in our govern- 
ment," was a remark often made in reply to accusations 
by the rebels that our government did not care whether 



DEVOTION TO COUNTRY. 171 

we starved or not. When I consider that this was the 
common hmguage of men suffering under miseries rarely, 
if ever, paralleled in history ; I cannot be astonished that 
the Union exists to-day. I feel a conscious joy that 
there was no act of mine, during a bitter imprisonment, 
to disgrace that flag. In referring to the North, as 
distinguished from tlie South, it was often spoken of as 
"God's country," and the old flag as "God's flag." 
Such was the halo of glory with which all its associa- 
tions seemed surrounded. 

Incidents were of such frequent occurrence patheti- 
cally illustrative of the prisoners' devotion to the glori- 
ous Stars and Stripes, that I will narrate one expressive 
of the form this devotion often took. A color-serseant 
of one of the regiments captured at Plymouth, N. C, 
died some time in August. While his companions were 
rendering the last services, — that rude preparation for 
the grave already described, — they discovered his regi- 
mental flag, which he had so often borne in battle, 
wrapped about his person. He had placed it secretly 
there to shield it from traitor hands. He could not 
bear that this loved symbol of his countiy's glory should 
be desecrated by the hands of traitors. Reverently his 
comrades gazed upon its folds, and silently, with tear- 
ful eyes, again restored it, as a fit covering for his 
noble breast, to be buried with him, A glorious wind- 
ing sheet for a patriot ! Dying men clung to little 
mementoes, such as a miniature flag, or the badge of 
their army corps. But it was the general constancy 



172 THE soldier's story. 

with which men ever cking through all their misery, 
with love to their country and its cause, which spoke 
more eloquently than any mere incident of their devo- 
tion, and the triumph of principles over circumstances 
of misery. 



EXCH,\NGE ON THE BKAIN. 173 



CHAPTER X. 

E schange on the Brain. — Eumors of Sherman's Movements. — Great 
Expectations and sad Results. — Fearful Mortality. — Hot Sun and 
powerful Rains. — Stockade swept away. — A Spring of pure 
Water. — A new Tunnelling Operation nearly fatal to its Projectors. 

— Rebel Aid for once welcomed. — Construction of rude Barracks. 

— Prospects of "Winter in Prison not encouraging. — Weary, 
miserable Days. — Increased Sickness and Mortality. — Names of 
fifty deceased in the Writer's Company. — Contrast of Loyal Blacks 
with Disloyal Whites. — Another Tunnelling Operation betrayed 
for Tobacco. — The Betrayer punished. — Believed to be a Spy. 

— Further Rumors of Exchange. — A Realization. — Great Joy. 

— Dying Comrade when Release was ordered. — An afi'scting 
Scene. — Delusive Hopes. — Departure from Andersonville. — 
Short Rations. — Doubtful Deliverance. — Charleston again. — A 
Talk with a Rebel Citizen. — Effects of the Siege on the City. — 
Pity and Sympathy. — Shot and Shell a Civilizer. — The Fail 
Grounds. 

HERE, as in other prisons, a fearful epidemic 
reigned, termed by old prisoners " Exchange on 
the Brain.'' Frequent rumors of exchange were cir- 
culated designedly by the rebels, for the purpose of 
quieting desperate men, and preventing the formation 
of dangerous plots for release and escape. Often these 
rumors seemed to have some foundation. Once the 
priest who had charge of the spiritual development of 
the prison commander, Wirz, came into prison, and 



174 THE soldier's story. 

read to a large concourse of prisoners, gathered to hear, 
extracts from a paper -purporting to give news of an 
exchange about to take place at Savannah. Prisoners 
coming in from Sherman's army brought news of a 
raid under Stoncman and McCook. The next news we 
heard was, that Stoneman's cavalry was fighting around 
Macon ; and then it was announced by exultant 
Johnnies, that Stoneman and his whole army were 
captured. This was partially confirmed by men belong- 
ing to his force, coming in as captives. They informed 
us of the siege of Atlanta, and reiterated the former 
news of an exchange agreed upon ; but when and 
where it was to take place, they had no information. 
When Stoneman was raiding towards us, with evident 
intentions of releasing the prisoners ; when rumors came 
of his having arms for the prisoners, — which I have 
since ascertained to be true, — our hearts beat high 
with hope. Those who had previously had tendencies 
of Exchange on the Brain, went fearfully wild with 
release in the same place. A few, who had learned by 
bitter experience how uncertain every thing in Dixie 
was, while cheered by bright prospects, put but little 
real confidence in them. Some pinned their faith and 
hopes so implicitly upon a release, that they were un- 
willing to wait even a day, and when at last they found 
their hopes and faith disappointed, sunk into a despon- 
dency from which nothing could arouse them, and 
died. Rumors and statements of an exchange were so 
frequently made and backed by evidence which looked 



TEEEJBLE MORTALITY. 175 

plausible, that the prisoners were expectant and de- 
spondent by turns during July and August. 

These two months were the most terrible of any 
experienced by the general prisoners. Nine thousand 
were said to have died during that space of time. In 
one day in August, no less than one hundred and sixty 
prisoners died, and the average was over a hundred 
daily. From the 1st of February to the 16th of 
September, twelve thousand Federal soldiers, prisoners 
of war, were carried from the prison to the dead man's 
trench and the felon's burial. Many of the deaths 
were hastened by despondency. After an usual excite- 
ment about exchange, — expecting to be called out to 
be released at any moment, — followed by disappoint- 
ment, deaths were the most frequent. 

Extreme heat, during July and August, was often 
followed by days dark with intermittent showers. On 
one occasion, during such a period, the ground was 
rendered so hot by the intense rays of the sun as to 
blister my feet by mere contact. This period of heat 
was followed by rain in such quantities as in a few 
hours to cause a freshet, which swept away the stockade 
where the brook entered and left the prison ; and also 
swept away portions on the north-west side, by the flow- 
ins: of the water down the hill-side. Wretched crea- 
tures all over the prison were crawling out of holes in the 
ground, in which they had burrowed, half drowned with 
the water which had suddenly filled them. Canteens, 
plates, bits of wood, blankets, spoons, pails, and hats, 



176 THE soldier's story. 

were swept away down the liill-side, the prisoners 
franticly rushing after their deserting goods and habita- 
tions. The only washing some of the poor fellows got 
was on such an occasion. It was curious to observe 
the different manner in which various individuals 
accepted of such a dispensation. Some laughed, others 
swore and abused fate, many screamed and cried as if 
mad, wliile still others crouched in the rain, or saw the 
whole scene unmoved, as if gazing on a panorama with 
which they had no concern. I sat at such times crouch- 
ing in the rain, my body bent up in a manner to bring 
my knees, stomach, and head in close contact, between 
which were folded and placed my jacket and ragged 
blanket, — my back exposed to the rain, forming a kind 
of roof to keep these valuables from the wet. But all 
in vain such an effort. The force of the rain, running 
down the hill-side, continually upset me, by under- 
mining the sand beneath my feet, until at last losing 
my blanket and plulosophy, miserable and grotesque as 
others, I went rushing and pitching after my tin pail 
and blanket, caught up and carried away by the 
torrent. 

Large forces were thrown out to protect the portions 
of stockade swept away by the flood, and keep the 
prisoners from desperate attempts at escape. All night 
under arms these forces were kept in position in the 
rain, until the stockade was repaired. Night and day 
artillery was manned, which commanded the broken 
portions of the stockade, and every precaution taken 



ANOTHER TUNNELLING OPERATION. 177 

against the escape of prisoners. One great good re- 
sulted from this freshet. On the hill-side where the 
stockade had been broken away, a spring was discov- 
ered, which supplied an abundance of pure water to the 
prisoners, greatly in contrast with the filthy stream 
which had been our only supply during the summer. 

Shortly after the foregoing event, I became engaged 
in a tunnelling operation, which came near proving 
fatal to its projector. Tunnels did not usually cave in, 
for these reasons : the top of the earth, after the tunnel 
passed under the dead line, was interlaced by roots and 
fibres, which formed sufficient adhesive power, in most 
parts of the stockade, to keep the earth from caving in. 
Besides, the earth was usually hard and clayey. In 
this case, however, after we got beyond the stockade, 
on the outside, we ran into sandy soil, where our mis- 
fortunes began. Two of us were digging, in the day- 
time, when, in our rear, the tunnel caved in, and 
effectually cut off our retreat into the stockade. Grad- 
ually it commenced falhng upon us, filhng our ears, 
eyes, and mouths with dirt. There seemed to be no 
release from our critical condition, except by digging 
upward, which we commenced to do with fear and 
trembling, as that operation was always attended with 
great danger of being buried alive. Suddenly, down 
came a mass of earth above us, which did not, as we 
anticipated, bury us so deep but that we scrambled 
out of it, slurieking with terror. The rebel guard at 
that time, coming around with the relief, rescued us 
12 



178 THE soldier's STORY. 

from our peril — the only time I was ever glad to see a 
rebel. / 

During the last of August, rude barracks were in 
process of construction in the upper portion of the new 
Btockade. This looked like preparations for winter, 
and gave us but little comfort, as these buildings con- 
sisted of roofs only, on uprights, and there was no pros- 
pect ol more than a very few being accommodated by 
their use. 

The weary, weary, dreadful days dragged slowly 
along, amid suffering and death in prison. September 
came. Over fifty of my company had died since the 
term of imprisonment began, which was not so large in 
proportion to their number as occurred in other compa- 
nies captured at the same time with ourselves. The 
majority of our two companies were veterans — strong 
men, inured to hardsliips and exposure by a previous 
experience in camp and field. Scarcely any of my com- 
pany died until after the middle of July ; August swept 
them away by scores. The following is an incomplete, 
imperfect list of those who died : Wm. Arrington^ 
Wm. Bessom, Nicholas Bessom, Chas. A. Bent, Wm. 
Brown, Winslow A. Bryant, B. G. M. Dyer, Wm. 
H. Burns, Geo. Combs, Peter Dunn, John Duffee, B. 
W. Drake, Geo. Edwards, Geo. Floyd, John Fegan, 
Cyrus B. Fishjr, Patrick Flynn, James Henry, G. P. 
Reed, S. A. Smith, John Shaw, J. Thomas, James 
Wilson, C. O. Wilson, F. A. Stephens, G. Arrington, 
Pat. Henley, Cha/'les Holbrook, Joseph Hoyt, Wm. H. 



LOYAL BLACKS DISLOYAL -WTIITES. 179 

Haynes, Wm. Jolmson, Michael Kelleher, Chas. A. 
Moore, Wm. McGrain, Chaa. Moss, John Milan, Ber- 
nard Mehan, C. M. Martin, John McDermot, John 
Nevison, Benj. Phillips, Chandler Petie, Patrick Regan, 
Wm. AVyman, Kendal Piersons, Wm. L. Gordon, and 
others whose names I have lost. 

Poor boys ! Noble fellows ! As I recall their names, 
memory brings each face, pale with prison suffering, 
before me. I cannot but have greater faith in human 
nature from having known them. Dear comrades ! 
(mdeared to me by many sufferings ! guilty of no 
crimes ; theirs was a death of lingering torture, to 
which, in comparison, the devices of the Inquisition 
Avould have been mercy. Victims of a relentless ha- 
tred which has not ceased with the war, your nameless, 
crowded graves dot the prison burial-ground, and point 
a solemn moral to the barbarities enacted there. To-day, 
when the men of Georgia ask the rights they formerly 
exercised, and amons; them the rio;ht of excluding the 
negro from the ballot-box, I wonder those patriot 
bones do not start from their crowded, shallow graves, 
to bear testimony that, while living, every white man 
of that locality banded with bloodhounds to prevent 
their escape, forming a network of vigilance through 
which it was almost an impossibility to break, and their 
only dependence was in the blacks, — the Unionists alone 
of that section, — who harbored them when it was a 
peril to their lives, and gave them of their food when 
they had but a bare subsistence for themselves. You 



180 THE soldier's STORY. 

who sit by the quiet fireside and read these records of 
sufiering, reflect, when you hear the clamorings of those 
who are trying to regain lost power, that they are those 
who, all over that southern land, by their silence con- 
sented, or by action indorsed, the barbarous treatment 
under which Union men lingered, sufiered and died 
amid the tortures of starvation. 

In September my last effort at gaining liberty by 
tunnelling was frustrated. Fifty men commenced a 
tunnel on a grand scale. It was nearly completed, and 
was the most perfect thing of the kind ever devised by the 
prisoners. It was commenced at the bottom of an old 
well, and two men could walk abreast from one end to 
the other. One of our number betrayed us to the rebel 
quartermaster for a plug of tobacco. Another of our 
companions saw them conversing, and, getting behind 
them, heard him propose to tell the quartermaster some- 
thing important, if he would give him the tobacco. He 
ran and informed us in season for us to make ourselves 
scarce. After the tunnel was discovered, those engaged 
in it were natm-ally enraged, and, seizing the traitor, 
printed on his forehead, with India ink and needles, in- 
delibly, the letter T. They were proceeding to worse 
punishment, when a rebel guard came into the stockade 
and carried him outside. In spite of evidence to the 
contrary, I have but little doubt he was a rebel spy, 
who had been sent in with other prisoners to betray us. 
Diligent inquiries were set on foot to find out who 
had punished the traitor in the manner described. To 



PROSPECTS OF EXCHAJSfGE. 181 

accomplish this, we were threatened with being starved 
into submission ; but the rations, after being stopped 
for twenty-four hours, were again issued. 

Rumors of exchange continued to pervade the prison. 
Men, crazy with the idea of freedom and home, wan- 
dered up and down the prison, clinging to every rumor, 
like drowning men to straws. The excitement was 
made worse by the extravagant rumor circulated around 
c<imp by the rebel quartermaster and the priest, who 
was said to be Wirz's confessor ! The excitement in- 
creased daily, and men were expecting at any moment 
to be called out. Many were called, but it was to that 
bourn from whence no traveller returns : many were 
released, but the herald of their freedom was the grim 
messenger. Death ! 

At last, after repeated rumors had prepared the 
prison for their purpose, orders came for certain of 
the detachments, or nineties, as they were termed, to 
be ready to leave the prison. We were told that there 
was a Federal transport fleet off* Savannah, waiting for 
us. To all in prison this seemed the dawn of freedom, 
and the most incredulous believed. Kentucky Joe, 
who always protested that everything was "dreadful 
onsartain in Dixie," became a convert, and had ex- 
change on the brain. Every one clamored for a chance, 
and feared to be left out of the exchange. Ninety after 
ninety went out of prison rejoicing, and faintly cheer- 
ing. It was cheering which brought teais to the eye, 



182 THE soldier's story. 

so puny and weak did it come from the poor, weak, 
starved fellows. But 

" The hollow eye grew bright, 
And the poor heart almost gay, 
As they thought of seeing home and friends again." 

I never hear that song without its recalling that scene. 
Men who had been brought by suffering to the very 
verge of idiocy, or who for months had been smitten 
with almost hopeless melancholy or despair, as these 
sounds came at last dimly to their ear, like remem- 
brance of a dream, their glorious import, "going home," 
burst upon them. They staggered to their feet, and 
were carried, by the pressure of a dense crowd, outside 
the prison, feebly cheering, or regardless of the pres- 
ence of rebels, joined in the chorus of 

" Kally round the flag, boys, rally once again." 

My ninety had got orders to be ready, and I was in a 
tremor of excitement, when one of my comrades sent 
for me, saying he was dying. My heart sank at think- 
ing of the suffering, dying men who must stay behind 
and perish. My heart almost reproached me for being 
glad, when companions who had stood by my side in 
days of battle were suffering — dying, with none to 
care for them, — without sister's or mother's hand to 
soothe them, without food, and with no shelter from 
the pitiless rain and sun. 

I went, and found John Nevison stretched on the 



EXCHANGE BY DEATH. 183 

poor remains of his blanket, (lying. How often the 
poor fellow, true to a stubborn Scotch nature, had ral- 
lied, and tried to live! "I am glad you are going 
home, Sarge." (His generous heart had room for joy 
at others' good fortune even in death.) "I wish you to 
send word to my mother" (Mrs. Margaret Nevison, 
Newcastle, England, on the Tyne) ; " tell her I enlisted 
to fight against slavery — for my adopted country. Tell 
her all about me ! " Poor fellow ! I understood him ; 
he wished me to tell her he had done his duty. Com- 
rade in battle, I can testify that none stood up in fight 
more manfully than John Nevison — he who so often 
had sung, with pathetic voice, the song, 

" Comrades, will you tell me, truly, 
Who shall care for mother now?" 

I now understood why he sung that song with so much 
feeling. He never before had spoken of his mother. 
Poor John ! enshrined in the hearts of comrades, you 
lie in your nameless grave among the victims of Ander- 
sonville ; and 

"Who will care for mother now?" 

I took his poor, thin hand in mine, and pledged him I 
would do all he wished. I forgot his address for a 
time, but in the delirium of a fever recalled it, though 
many other forgotten things were not again brought to 
mind. 

I was waiting for my turn to come to get out of 



184 THE soldier's story. 

prison. Every subterfuge was resorted to to go with 
the lucky ones. Those who had means bribed ; those 
who had none "flanked," and were rewarded ofttimes 
with broken heads, for others became savage at the 
idea of being cheated out of their chance, and the 
police exercised anything but a protecting influence 
upon the unlucky heads of flankers. Those who tried 
their wits received often a reminder upon their brain, 
not as a test of its quality, but as a check to its further 
exercise. Men were crying at the gate, as we went 
out, at being defrauded of their chance by some auda- 
cious flanker. I went at last, rejoicing at what ap- 
peared to be the day of deliverance. As I passed rebel 
headquarters, I saw Sergeant Smith, who, it will be 
remembered, was one of my captors when I escaped at 
one time from Anderson ville. "Well, Smith," said I, 
" there are no bloodhounds after me this trip home- 
ward." The Sergeant shook his head (it seems to me, 
sorrowfully, when I recall it now) to see us thus elated 
by delusive hopes of " going home," destined, O, in 
how many cases, never to be realized ! We reached the 
depot, were divided into squads of sixty, and crowded 
into box cars. We were full of hope, however, and 
kept saying, "Well, we shall have room enough soon." 
Our rations had been previously placed in each car — a 
piece of corn-cake about the shape and size of a brick. 
We were told these were our rations for three days' 
journey. One of my comrades, J. W. D., desperately 
resolved to preserve a piece of the bread to carry home 



DEPARTURE — WHITHER ? 185 

as a cm iosity ; but hunger got the better of the poor 
fellow's resolve, and I saw the last crumb disappearing 
before the afternoon of our second day's journey. 

During the first day, three men died in the car where 
I was. My bread lasted me two days, as I was careful 
not to eat too much at a time ; yet it was considerable 
trouble to have it around — a continual temptation to 
myself and to others. We arrived at Macon the after- 
noon of our first day's travel. The vigilance of the 
guard was here redoubled, and the fact excited our 
suspicion that there was to be no exchange, after all. 
As we passed thi-ough Macon, one of Stoneman's men 
pointed out to me the bullet marks on the buildings and 
fences made by our advance just before his capture. 
We had been suspicious that we were going to Ala- 
bama, but our hearts rose within us as the cars took 
the direction for Savannah. A negro informed us that 
" Captin Sherman " had taken Atlanta, and was making 
for Macon as "tight as he can come." This looked like 
removing us to a place of security rather than an ex 
change ; still, we were hopeful that we were to be 
exchanged to prevent our capture. As we neared Sa-^ 
vannah, and changed our guard, the officer of the new 
guard came up, and we made inquiries of him as to our 
destination — if we were to be exchanged. He replied 
by candidly stating that we were to be placed down on 
one of the islands, under fire from the Federal guns. 
Several men were shot, on our route from Savannah to 
Charleston, while trying to escape from the cars. We 



186 THE soldier's story. 

caught sight of our fleet in the distance, as we passed 
over the bridge leading to Charleston, — and our hearts 
thrilled with a savage kind of joy, when we heard the 
shell from our batteries, shrieking over the city. We 
termed them Gilmore's errand boys, or Gilmore's 
morning reports on the condition of rebeldom. 

At last the cars were halted in the streets of Charles- 
ton, and citizens, negroes, and soldiers, thronging the 
streets, peered curiously into the cars, to get a look at 
the Yanks. It appeared to nie, then, that they wore a 
haggard, care-worn look. The only hopeful face of 
the group was some old negress, who had kept fat and 
jolly on the idea of Uncle Abe's coming soon. Said 
one citizen to another, in my hearing, "They are all 
foreigners — ain't they ? " This riled me not a little, and 
I replied, saying, " You recollect the Plymouth pris- 
oners who passed through these streets in April ? " 
"Yes, perfectly; a very fine body of men," said he. 
" These are the same men ; your government has 
starved all semblance of men out of us." "You are a 
foreigner?" said he, looking sneeringly and critically 
at my dilapidated wardrobe and dirty face, which had 
been guiltless of washing for the three days of our 
journey. " No, I belong to Massachusetts ! " I proudly 
replied. He seemed much shocked, either at the fact 
of our condition, or that any one should not be ashamed 
to hail from Massachusetts. 

It was just before sundown when we were formed in 
line, and marched through the back streets of Charles^ 



CHARLESTON AGAIN. 187 

ton. The effects of the siege were visible upon e very- 
hand, but we were informed that the damage done was 
really worse than mere appearances indicated. The 
shell made only an irregular hole through the exterior 
walls, whereas the interior of buildings where shell had 
exploded was often a mass of ruins. It was no figure 
of speech, but a reality, that grass was growing in 
the streets of the proud but doomed city which fii'st 
raised its defiant hand against the Federal government. 
The shell and shot from Gilmore's batteries had a 
civilizing influence over its people, for in no place were 
we so kindly treated by citizens and soldiers as in 
Charleston. Women and children looked pityingly 
upon us, and such expressions as "Poor fellows!" 
" Too bad ! " &c., showed pity and sympathy for our 
condition, which we had never before experienced* in 
the Confederacy. 

I noticed that those citizens whose dress betokened 
that they belonged to the better classes wore often a 
sober, subdued look, which, during my experience in the 
war, I had observed as the result of much anxiety, 
mental suffering, and loss of friends. I addressed one 
of these as we were waiting on the street — " Ain't you 
folks about sick of all tliis fighting?" "We are tired 
of it, dreadful sick of it," said he, while he vainly tried 
to keep back the tears that ran down his face ; " but we 
are going to fight you'un Yanks just as long as we kin." 
Noble stuff — worthy of a more decent cause. 

Finally, just as the sun was setting in an ocean of 



188 THE soldier's story. 

beautiful clouds, we arrived at our destination on the 
" Fair Ground," or "Race Course," in the rear of Charles- 
ton, where were about five thousand of the Anderson- 
ville prisoners, who had preceded us. The situation 
was pleasant ; the green grass, to which our sight had 
been unused for many weary months, met the eye with 
refreshing pleasantness. The situation was better than 
we had anticipated, though we were disappointed in not 
being placed down on the islands, where we could see 
the flash of friendly artillery, or perchance the old flag, 
for no one who has not had such experience can under- 
stand the longing of our hearts for the old flag, and for 
familiar sigrhts. 



IMPKISONMENT AT CHARLESTON. 189 



CHAPTER XI. 

Imprisonment on the Fair Ground. — Improved Condition. — Hard- 
Tack and the Fear of losing it. — Tin Pail stolen. — Great Mis- 
fortune. — Loss of Caste by it. — Kindness of Women. — Ludicrous 
Tumbling into Wells. — Gilmore's Morning Reports welcomed. — 
The Dead Line again. — Continued large Mortality. — Want of 
Hospital Accommodations. — Good Offices of Sisters of Charity. — 
The Issue of Rations. — More Variety, but not of Quantity. — Ex- 
pedients to obtain an Increase. — The Rebels baffled in Counting. 

— Honorable conduct of Colonel Iverson. — Scarcity of Wood. — 
Sad Cases of Destitution. — Shocking Condition of the Writer. — 
Effects of Scurvy. — Death wliile waiting for Food. — Decreased 
Rations. — Plans for Escape. — A Trial at it. — Recaptured. — A 
warm Fire. — Sent to the Workhouse. — Improvement on the 
Camp. — Discovery of interesting Papers. — Sent back again to 
Prison. — A new Partnership. — Rations getting worse. — Further 
Attempts to bribe Prisoners to Disloyalty. — Starved and insane 
Men consent. — A Speech and its good Effects. — The picturesque 
Appearance of the Orator. — Yellow Fever. — Ludicrous Incidents. 

— Leave Charleston. — Journey to Florence. — Another Attempt to 
escape. 

THE Fair Ground proper, when seen under favor- 
able circumstances, must have been a beautiful 
spot. It contained an area of about forty acres, sur- 
rounded by dense overhanging trees, interwoven by 
ivy, laurel, and honeysuckle, forming an almost im- 
penetrable foliage. Aside from a distant view, we were 
not allowed any of the enjoyments which such shade 



190 THE soldier's STORY. 

and beauty could confer. We were placed in the centre 
of the Fau' Ground, with no shade or habitations, except 
such as we might construct from our garments or 
ragged blankets ; but there was a cool breeze from the 
ocean, and the sound of bells and the rattle over pave- 
ments came pleasantly to the ear. The sight of green 
foliage refreshed the gaze of miserable men, for a long 
time unused to pleasant sights and sounds. 

The night of our arrival, three "hard-tack" were issued 
as rations, for twenty-four hours, to each man, and we 
were in the third heavens in anticipating such luxurious 
rations each succeeding day. That night, after devour- 
ing two of my "hard crackers," I lay down to rest with 
the remaining one in my tin pail, under my head, for my 
morning's breakfast. I found it impossible to keep my 
mind from the hard-tack long enough to get to sleep, 
supposing some one would steal it while I was slum- 
bering : the thought was maddening. Vainly I endeav- 
ored to divert my mind from craving hunger, by saying 
the multiplication-table. It was "no go." That hard- 
tack was so fascinating ! Hunger, and fear of losing it, 
got the better of the contest with sleep, and I could 
bear no more. Arousing myself, I devoured that 
"infantry square," in one time and several motions, not 
down in the tactics. I never remember of enjoying any 
food, however luxurious, as I did that hard cracker. 

I mention this incident, insignificant in itself, as 
illustrative of how little it took to elate or depress men 
in our condition. That night, however, I met with the 



A GREAT MISFORTUNE. 191 

great misfortune of my imprisonment. Some vagabond 
stole my little tin pail, which, I may say without ex- 
aggeration, had been my best friend dm'ing the preced- 
ing months of ray captivity. It had been such a con- 
venience to myself and companions, that few, who have 
not been prisoners, can understand how great a loss it 
was. Used by one and another, sometimes it was not 
off a fire during the day, except long enough to change 
hands. 

I was reduced, by this misfortune, thenceforward 
through my imprisonment, to the unpleasant alternative 
of borrowing cooking utensils, or of eating my rice, flour, 
or Indian meal raw. It took so little in prison to make 
one's circumstances indescribably miserable, that this 
really was an overwhelming misfortune. The loss 
of a fortune at home could not have so affected my 
well-being or "good standing" among companions. 
From one accustomed to confer favors on others, I 
became dependent, and begging and hunting, often for 
whole days, for some one willing to loan me a tin quart 
to cook in. 

On the morning following, the people of Charleston 
came in flocks to see the Yankees. A majority of these 
were women. Some few came with food to sell, but 
were not allowed to trade over the guard line with pris- 
oners. Others, actuated by pity, watched for chances, 
and, when the rigor of the guard was relaxed, threw 
cakes, potatoes, or some like luxuries, over the guard 
line among the wretched creatures who gathered waiting 



192 THE soldier's story. 

for luck to favor them in some manner. The food thus 
thrown in was, however, but a drop in that Maelstrom 
of human miserables, who, actuated by hunger, strug- 
gled madly among each other for its possession. After 
a time, this feeding of the common prisoners was 
stopped, and the women were told to confine their man- 
ifestations of pity to the hospital, which was situated 
outside of the prison grounds, in our rear. Many a 
poor fellow, who otherwise would have died, lives to 
bless the women of Charleston. May those whose 
hands were thus lifted in pity never be stricken down 
with that hopeless hunger which tliey sought so kindly 
to reheve ! 

The next evening we received as rations two " hard- 
tack" per man, and a rarity of about two ounces of 
fresh meat, — which last was, so far as I observed, 
eaten raw throughout the camp at one sitting. Thus it 
was that we were inclined to be pleased with the change 
in our situation, in spite of disappointment about ex- 
change. During the first two weeks, I had not been 
fortunate enough to get the means of constructing shel- 
ter. One day, when wood was being brought to the 
camp for the use of the prison, I accosted an officer, 
whom I saw around camp, and requested him to get me 
three sticks from the wood-pile, that I might construct 
a shelter from the sun by raising my blanket upon them. 
Contrary to my expectations, lie at once kindly complied 
with my wishes, and I was made happy with the means 
of constructing a "shebang." Upon subsequent in- 



GILMOEE'S KEPOETS. 193 

quiry, I found this officer to be Lieutenant-Colonel 
Ivcrson, in command of the camp. He had very strong 
prejudices against Yankees, but was inclined to do all 
within liis limited power to better the condition of the 
prisoners. 

At Charleston we obtained a kind of brackish water, 
by digging shallow wells from six to ten feet deep. In 
a short time, so easy were they to dig, they became so 
plenty as to be annoying and inconvenient to the pedes- 
trians around camp. Plenty of water, coupled with the 
fact that, about twice a week, we got a small piece of 
eoap, caused clean faces to become more common than 
ever before in prison. The inconvenience above men- 
tioned was so great that one could not walk around in 
the evening without being precipitated into a well. Thus 
many a fellow took an extemporized bath, in which his 
feet and legs, or head and shoulders, got the uncontem- 
plated benefit of water. Under such disadvantages, 
night-A^Tilking became unpopidar and unpleasant. 

Each morning, about sunrise, shell from the guns 
of the Federal batteries down the harbor would begin 
to burst over a prominent steeple of the city. The 
report of the gun which sent the missile could not 
usually be heard. These were termed, among the pris- 
oners, Gilmore's morning reports. Sometimes a shell 
would burst over the Fair Ground, which would be re- 
ceived with great enthusiasm among the prison boys, 
and Avith demonstrations of applause, such as, "Bully 
for the Swamp Angel," &c. Some days the bombard- 



194 THE soldier's story. 

ing would be very active, and we could hear in the 
city the dull thud, and the ripping and tearing, as the 
shell penetrated or burst in buildings. As may be sup- 
posed, it was diverting to us to see and hear these evi- 
dences of retributive justice going on among our foes. 
If one had fallen in our very midst, I have no doubt 
our boys s\^ould have cried, "Bully!" so welcome, 
always, were these evidences of the nearness of friends. 
The people of Charleston seemed to have got accus- 
tomed to them to such a degree that, during the 
heaviest bombardment of September, when none cared 
to stay in the lower portion of the city, the boys were 
unconcernedly flying their kites. I counted eighteen 
kites up wliile one of the heaviest bombardments was 
going on. Fires were of such frequent occurrence, 
resulting from shells, that the fire department became 
almost as important as that of the military. 

On the first week of my confinement at Charleston, 
our old enemy, the dead line, was introduced. A ne- 
gro, superintended by the " irrepressible " white man, 
was sent around camp, turning a furrow with a plough 
and its mule attachment. This was the line which to 
overstep was death to the prisoner. None but those 
prisoners in comparatively good health had been sent 
from Anderson ville. For quite a time an effort seemed 
to be made to relieve our misery ; but the great mass 
had been starved and exposed to sun and rain too long to 
be benefited by anything short of a most radical change. 
Hence men died about as fast, in proportion to their 



HOSPITAL. — SISTERS OF CHARITY. 195 

numbers, as at Andersonville. Scurvy, diarrhoea, and 
fever swept the prisoners off in vast numbers. 

The place dignified by being called "the hospital," 
did not contain a single tent, the only shelter being, 
here and there, blankets raised on sticks, which were 
inadequate protection from rain or sun. Colonel Iver- 
son, who, I believe, was, for a time, in command of the 
prison, made strenuous efforts for our benefit. A sut- 
ler was appointed for the camp, who was not allowed to 
ask of prisoners higher prices than asked in the city. 
This was a convenience to those who had money, but 
the great majority had none. The sutler's store of 
goods contained but few varieties — black pepper, un- 
ground, turnips, sweet potatoes, and baker's bread. 
Ten dollars in Confederate money for one in greenbacks 
was the general rate of exchange ; and this was obtained 
tlu'ough the Sisters of Charity, who visited us, doing 
acts of kindness to the suffering, bringing clothes and 
food, carrying messages to our oflficers, prisoners in the 
city, and bringing the reply. To people so cleanly we 
must have been objects of disgust. The vermin, visible 
upon all prisoners, could not have been pleasant to 
vefined persons, unaccustomed to such misery. Our 
dirt-begrimed, half-naked persons must have been re- 
volting, yet no word or look from these kindly Sisters 
showed shrinking or disgust. I have seen them bending 
in prayer or in offices of mercy over almost naked crea- 
tiu-es, whom disease and filth had rendered indescriba- 
bly loathsome, never, by word or look, showing other 



196 THE soldier's story. 

feeling than pity, and never making the object of theii 
care feel humiliation or shame. Their kindly address of 
" My poor child ! " fell pleasantly on the ear. No im- 
portunities could vex them, and I do not remember of 
having heard an utterance of impatience from their lips. 
I may have been prejudiced, at first, against these Sisters 
of Charity, but certainly their acts were truly Cln-istian, 
worthy of imitation by aU on like occasions. 

As I have said, gangrene, diarrhoea, and scurvy 
raged terribly in camp, notwithstanding our improved 
condition. It was about the third week of my stay at 
Charleston, I was told that Corporal Gibson, of my 
company, whom I have mentioned in preceding pages, 
lay dying. I found this brave man lying in the hot 
6un, with no shelter or attendant. Said he, " I could 
have lived to get out of the hands of any savages but 
these ; they are too cruel for an old man like me to 
expect from them anything less than death." The 
untold sufferings this man endured, — who once had 
refused to purchase freedom and life as the price of 
treason, — retaining clearness of mind until the mo- 
ment of death, was but one instance among the many 
daily occurring in prison. A young soldier, who at 
one time had been clerk of Company G, second Massa- 
chusetts heavy artillery, died dming the same week at 
Charleston. In his last moments he continually said, 
" I should be wilHng to die if I could have enough to 
eat, and die at home." Thus longings for home and 
food and thoughts of death were often bitterly crowded 
together. 



EXTRA RATIONS BY DECEPTION. 197 

For convenience in issuing rations, the prisoners were 
divided into detachments of thousands, and then sub- 
divided into hundi'eds. There were sergeants of thou- 
sands and sergeants of hundreds, and a chief sergeant 
over the whole. These divisions were to facihtate the 
issue of rations, and the sergeants were selected from 
among the prisoners, and were often chosen by them. 
Much trouble, first and last, occurred in prison from 
the rebels never being able to count the prisoners cor- 
rectly. We were often counted, but with no satisfac- 
toiy results. There were, throughout the prison, so 
many hungry men — whose wits seemed to sharpen in 
proportion to their hunger — continually devising ways 
to get " extra feed," that it was not strange that the 
rebels frequently found themselves issuing more r.itions 
than there were men in prison. By judicious manage- 
ment, ingenious Yankees contrived to belong to two or 
more squads, and draw rations for each without exciting 
suspicion. Upon one count the rebel sergeants found 
they had issued five hundred more rations than there 
were men in camp ; and even by exercise of the greatest 
care in these countings, they would often be cheated 
two or thi-ee hundred men, through the dexterity which 
]»risoners had acquired of shifting from one squad to 
another, and getting counted twice. Once, while en- 
deavorinof to count us, Colonel Iverson was so baffled 
by the tactics, that he dismissed the matter for the da} , 
good naturedly declaring that we were "heavy dogs." 

At last, in despau- of finding out the exact number 



198 THE soldier's stoey. 

of Yanks in any other manner, they marched the pris- 
oners out into the open space, and kept us standing in 
line until counted ; but even here, where any cheat 
seemed certain of being detected, and though threat- 
ened with punishment if we played Yankee tricks on 
them, the men of the rear rank were managed in such 
a manner that, in our detachment, a Httle over nine 
hundred men contrived to count up a thousand. The 
officer counting us mistrusted something wrong, and 
recounted us twice, without detecting the cheat, but 
expressed his distrust in a kind of a stage aside, saying, 
" You'n Yanks are the doggondest fellows I ever did 
count." The rebels in this transaction reminded me of 
Cuffee, who, being asked by his master if he had 
counted all the pigs, replied, " Yes, massa, all 'cept a 
little speckled one ; he run'd round so I couldn't count 
him." They never succeeded to their liking in making 
us come out straight. 

About this time Colonel Iverson detected the sutler 
in two offences : first, of receiving greenbacks in pay 
ment for goods, — a criminal offence in the Confederacy, 
— and, second, charging the prisoners exorbitajit prices 
in trading. Whereupon he confiscated the green- 
backs, to be used to obtain comforts for our sick, and 
forced him to conform to the schedule of prices in 
the city. The following were, with little variation, the 
prices charged in Confederate money : Bread, one dollar 
jjer loaf; sweet potatoes, ten dollars per bushel; three 
flat turnips, one dollar; black pepper, ten dollars per 



PRISONEllS EOBBED. 199 

ounce. Taking into consideration the fact that one 
dollar in greenbacks wonld bring ten dollars in Con- 
federate money, it made the schedule of prices ex- 
tremely reasonable to those who were lucky enough to 
ha^e money. There were, however, only a very few 
fortunate ones who had managed to conceal money, and 
get into prison with it. Those who had been cap- 
tured during the summer in the vicinity of Richmond, 
underwent strict searches, and were robbed of their 
money, watches, and other valuables by the authorities, 
who pretended that they would again be restored when 
their imprisonment was over. Whatever may have been 
their intentions at the time, I never knew of but one 
instance where such promises were fulfilled, and that 
was in the case of Colonel Iverson, who had taken away 
greenbacks to the amount of many hundred dollars, 
and when the prisoners were released, restored the 
money. The great majority of prisoners had not a cent 
in their pockets, nor a pocket to put it in if they had a 
cent. To such the sale of the delicacies mentioned 
was nothing but an aggravation. If potatoes had 
sold for five cents a bushel, not more than one man 
in a hundred of the prisoners could have purchased 
a peck. 

After giving us hard-tack for a few days, raw rations 
were issued in prison iu very small quantities, in which 
the rebels seemed to have adopted a plan to make 
variety take the place of quantity. Rations for each 
man per day were for a time as follows : Tv,'o heaped 



200 THE soldier's story. 

spoonfuls of rice, two of flour, one of beans, and on^ 
of hominy. I remember it more particularly, as one of 
my comrades, who acted as a squad sergeant, usually 
divided the rations with a common teaspoon. Some- 
times this estimate would fall short, but rarely, if ever, 
overrun. Wood was issued in quantities of about one 
common cord wood pine stick for twenty men per day. 
But its issue was very irregular. Sometimes none would 
be given for weeks. There was, however, a good ex- 
cuse for this, for all the wood had to be brought a long 
distance on the cars, and then brought in teams to the 
prison ground. As there was a scarcity of rolling stock 
in those parts, this was a better excuse than could be 
found at Andersonville, where the prison was surrounded 
by a dense pine forest. 

Many of the prisoners were destitute of cooking 
utensils, and could not borrow ; and either from want 
of strength to run round, or getting discouraged by 
failures, after repeated rebuffs upon application for such 
favors, they would eat their I'ations raw, or go without. 
A young fellow belonging to the eighty-fifth New York 
independent battery, named Myers, had nothing in 
which to draw his rations, but a boot leg, into which he 
had fitted a wooden bottom. He had no cooking 
utensil, and ate his rations from this boot leg, without 
a spoon, day after day, uncooked, sometimes stirred up 
in a little water. This miserable being camped on the 
ground near the place I occupied. He scarcely ever lay 
down at night without wishing; that he might never 



CONDITION OF THE WEITER. 203 

awake. It did, indeed, require more courage to livt 
than to die. At last, after days and nights of lingering 
torture, his prayers for death were answered. Near 
me, one morning, I found his cold and lifeless form 
stretched upon the ground. He had died, his eyes 
closed as if in sleep. I noticed something clasped in 
his hand, and stooped to examine it. It was the likeness 
of a beautiful girl, and on the back was written in a 
delicate female hand, "To William, from Sarah" — a 
whole history of love, disappointment, and death, in 
brief. When I reflected that each man among the 
thousands dying around me had histories similar in their 
griefs, and loves, and longings for home, and when I 
considered the bitter pangs of dying men uncared for 
among worse than barbarians, it seemed too much of 
human misery for contemplation or utterance. 

One day, when some Sisters of Charity came into the 
prison limits, — no very agreeable task for a cleanly 
female, — one of them remarked, in apology for not 
havinfif sfot some article which she had undertaken to 
obtain for one of our number, that the firing was so 
heavy that it was not safe to venture down in the part 
of the city where such things were sold. These kindly 
Sisters attended to all alike without ever inquiring our 
cfeed, or appearing to think they were doing anything 
more than a duty. 

My physical condition at this time was worse than at 
any time during my captivity. My clothes were in 
tatters, scurvy had drawn up the cords of my legs, and 



202 THE soldier's story. 

from the same cause my teeth were almost dropping 
from my jaws ; my gums and mouth were swollen, and 
it became difficult to eat the most common food. My 
bones ached so intensely at times that I could find no 
more appropriate name for the pain than " teethache " in 
them. Something must be done. I must make con- 
tinual efforts, or go down to the dogs' death many were 
suffering ai'ound me. So I used to wander around 
camp, picking up potato peelings from the mud and 
dirt, which some " well-to-do " fellow had thrown away. 
These I washed, and ate raw ; and I have no doubt they 
did me much good. Once or twice, I was lucky in 
obtaining some turnip-tops, which I cooked, and 
enjoyed hugely. But there were thousands of hungry 
men on the lookout for these delicacies as well as my- 
self, and therefore it took continued and persevering 
efforts for me to get a nibble once a week. This 
vegetable food checked the scurvy, and kept it at least 
within bounds. 

The hospital was at last moved into one corner of the 
prison grounds. One day it was rumored that vegeta- 
ble soup would that day be issued to the sick of the 
prison. A man who could crawl was not considered 
sick. A poor sick fellow near begged me to take his 
dish and draw some for him. This I undertook to do, 
and after waiting some hours I got the soup, and 
returned quickly to the sick man. He was sitting on 
the ground, his hands clasped, and his head upon his 
knees. I spoke to him, but he did not answer. I 



PLAJSrS FOE ESCAPE. 203 

touched his hand — raised it — it fell lifeless from my 
gi-asp ; he was dead — died while sitting, wniting for 
food in this moiuTiful position. It was quite common 
for men to die thus suddenly. In my squad I was 
knowing to several instances of men's drawing their 
rations, and dying an hour or two afterwards. I took 
the dead man's place in eating the soup, for however 
isorry I was for him, I was too himgry to refrain from 
relishing the food. That afternoon, with a full stom- 
ach, I felt like patronizing everybody. 

About the last of September, we learned from our 
g\iard that five or six thousand rebel prisoners had been 
landed on one of the islands, in possession of our forces, 
in Chai'leston harbor, to occupy a stockade built for 
that purpose. This, perhaps, explained the reason why 
we were not put down under fire ourselves. 

I had often, when low in health, and restless under 
the restraints of captivity, tmTied over in my mind the 
probabilities of an escape. The rations of the prison 
were steadily growing less in quantity, and the extreme 
negligence or the purposed plans of the rebels kept us 
frequently for twenty-four hours without food. Rest- 
lessly seeking some mitigation of these sufferings, it 
appeared to me possible that some dark night I might 
crawl on my hands and knees through and beyond the 
guard. There was great danger of being shot, but 
there were other ten'ors in prison which woidd thus be* 
left behind. I made a copy of a map of Charleston 
and vicinity, determined to try my luck the fiist dark, 



204 THE soldier's story. 

rainy night, favorable to siich an undertaking. M} 
plans were vague and general, the idea of getting to 
the water, and obtaining sometliing to float upon dovna 
the harbor in the night, being uppermost ; or, if I did 
not get a boat or a log, to get into the city, and trust 
to some of tlie German people for a suit of clothes or 
concealment. At any rate my condition might be 
bettered, and could scarcely be made worse. 

Under the inspiration of these ideas, one rainy night 
in Septemlier, milking a confidant of no one, I crawled 
beyond the guard. I could hear their measured tramp, 
and one stood so near to me that I could hear him 
breathe. Indeed, I thought myself perceived, when he 
wheeled upon his heel and walked his post in another 
direction, giving me a good opportmiity to creep by. 
I got to a safe distance from the sentinel, then rising to 
my feet, ran towards the north part of the Fair Ground, 
forced my way tlu'ough the dense foliage which enclosed 
it, when tlierc biurst upon my vision with lurid glare, 
ahead and about me, a number of camp fires, around 
which soldiers gathered. " Halt ! " came the sharp 
salutation, close on my left. I heeded not the com- 
mand, but ran, steering midway between two fires. 
" Halt ! " " Halt ! " simultaneously came the order from 
nght and left of me. Still I ran on. Bang! bang! 
bang ! rang the report of three or four rifles, aimed true 
enough for me to hear the angry z-z-z-z-t of the bullets 
as they whispered death around my ears. Close upon 
me, right ahead again, came the order, "Halt!" T 



ESCAPE — EECAPTURE. 205 

halted, answering the summons, "Who goes there?" 
which i*apidly" followed the command, " Halt ! " bj i-eply- 
ing, " A friend." " Yank, sun*ender ! " laughingly called 
out the sentinel. I obeyed promptly, as I heard hin) 
bring Ins musket to a full cock, with an ominous click, 
and saw uncomfortably near me the gleaming of the 
jjolished musket. All this occm-red in less time than I 
have taken to relate it. " Wliat in dosf-sond-ation was 
yer tryin' to do ? " interrogated the Johnny. " Trying 
to pick up some warm quarters," I responded, as I 
walked to the fire and commenced wanning myself. 
" Reckon yer found it dimied warm, when the Charles- 
ton Guards commenced to blaze at yer, old boss ! " 
laughed my captor. I tried to show my contempt by 
saying, "O, that's nothing when one is used to it." 
"1 leckon I'd er let daylight through yer, before yer got 
used to it, if yer hadn't stopped 'bout as yer did." I 
laughed at liim, thinking it best to take things easy, 
while he called the officer of the guard. "Well, 111 
be dumed," said he, slapping my shoulder as a compli- 
ment, "if yer am't right smart, for a Yank, any way." 
Wliile waiting for the officer of the guard, one of the 
sentinels gave me a hard cracker, and my captor pre- 
sented to me a generous slice of " sow-belly," which, I 
couldn't help thinking, was an ample reward for the 
risks I had run. The officer of the guard came up, and 
began to question me as to how I got beyond the sen- 
tinels of the prison grounds. "Bribed them," replied 
I, not caring what answer I made, so long as I did not 



206 THE soldier's STORY. 

give him any information. He looked at me from head 
to foot, seriously, for a second, then, as if struck with 
my picturesque costume of rags, smiled and chuckled, 
as if intensely amused, and said, " They must have 
tooken a mighty slim bribe." 

I slept by the warm fire, under guard, that night, 
and the next morning was sent to the workhouse, iu 
the city. This building was of brick, built on three 
eides of a square, with two towers, one of which, I 
noticed, had been split down, by collision of solid shot or 
shell, from top to bottom. Under the arched ways of 
the building, which led from the yard, were two rudely- 
constructed ovens, used by the officers for cooking their 
food. In the budding were the quarters of Federal 
officers. The windows w^ere heavily grated. In the 
yard was a high lookout tower, from which could be 
seen the jail-yard adjoining. I staid here two days, 
congratulating myself on my improved quarters, which, 
in contrast with the Fair Ground, were very comfort- 
able, though I was not allowed inside the building, 
and I was only fearful of being sent back to the Race 
Course. While prying around in the archways of the 
building, I found, in one corner of a dark doorway, a 
bundle of documents which threw light upon the pur- 
pose for which the building had formerly been used, 
and the manner in which slaves were committed for 
punishment. The following is a sample of a fcAV in my 
possession : — 



RETURNED TO PRISON. 207 

" Master of the Workhouse : Receive Jerry, and put 
him in sol. con. RoB. Rowand. 

Aug. 14, '56." 

"July 10, '58. 
"Master of Workhouse : Receive the girl, Mary, give 
lier (15) fifteen paddles, and return to me. 

Sam'l Watson." 

"Master of the Workhouse : Give Hulda 5 paddles, 
put her in confinement 12 hours, and return to me. 
Jan. 20, '56. J. Ricker." 

On the morning of the third day, to my great dis- 
gust, I was sent to the Fair Ground, under guard. I 
kept pretty still about my adventure, being a little 
ashamed of not escaping after so many trials, and my 
comrades merely remarked that they hadn't seen me 
around for a day or two, and did not know but that 
I had had my "toes tied together." That day I hunted 
up Jesse L., who was formerly a comrade in the engi- 
neer corps, and re-formed a kind of partnership, which 
had been, for a time, suspended — to sleep under the 
same shred of a blanket, cook, hunt vermin together, 
and take turns watching each other's traps, while one 
was in quest of potato peelings or drawing rations. 
Jesse was a good-natured fellow, who was accustomed 
to say of himself that he could " scarcely draw breath 
on the rations he drew, and was running down so fast 
he couldn't run around." He was capable of laughing 
at any amount of misery, and baffled and held death at 



208 THE soldier's story. 

arms' length by ingenious devices ; and his " devil-may- 
care " temperament, which nothing could daunt, and his 
irrepressible drollery, which would bubble up from the 
midst of misery, made him a desirable companion, to 
lighten the loads of despair which hung around us like 
a pall of midnight darkness. 

Colonel Iverson had left the command of the camp, 
and we were miserably starved and neglected, having, 
often, the mockery of uncooked rations issued us, when 
there was not a chip or stick in the whole camp with 
which to cook. It was during one of these periods 
of extra starvation, when we had not had food for forty- 
eight hours, when the strongest men among us, through 
weakness, staggered and fell in endeavoring to walk, 
that a well-dressed officer from the city rode to the en- 
trance, as it was termed, where rations were usually 
issued, and made to the prisoners there congregated, 
waiting in hopes of receiving rations, the proposition 
to go out and work. The following, as near as I can 
recollect, was the substance and manner of his propo- 
sition. 

"We wish you to work down on the islands, under 
guard, as prisoners ; it is work which any of you can 
do — which, as soldiers, you have been accustomed to. 
You won't have to take a musket : there are none com- 
pelled to go ; but those, after what I have said here, 
who do volunteer to go, will be made to perform the 
work required of them, whether they like it or not. In 
return, we will give you rations of flour, meat, rum, 
and tobacco." 



GOOD EITECTS OF A SPEECH. 209 

Ah, well do I remember that the very mention of 
fresh meat and flom' was enough, almost, to craze me 
at that time. I remember how wishful and longing 
those poor fellows looked. Yet I had seen so much 
of their constancy unde: suffering, that I was not pre- 
pared to hear them clamor as they did to go out and 
work for food. It was a cruel temptation. The poor 
fellows had become childish, and knew not what they 
were doing. Said an old Belle Island prisoner, stand- 
ing at my side, "Some one ought to speak to these 
men ; they are crazy with hunger." Under an uncon- 
trollable impulse, I clambered upon an empty rice cask, 
and commenced to speak. "Wait," said the officer, 
addressing me, "until I leave." After this he said, 
"All those who wish to avail themselves of the oppor- 
tunity, may go and get their traps, and be ready about 
dark to leave the prison." He bowed to me, and say- 
ing, "You can now listen to your friend," withdrew a 
short distance out of camp, sitting on his horse, where 
he could hear what was said. 

My theme had in it inspiration. I think I never did, 
nor ever shall, speak with such effect as then. I com- 
menced by saying, "This rebel officer has honorably 
stated what he requires of you. You understand that 
he wishes you to dig rifle pits for our enemies, though 
he has not squarely said so. However honorable it may 
be for him to make this proposition to hungry, suffering 
men, it is treason for you to accept." I then spoke to 
them of their homes, of their friends, of the cause, and 
14 



210 THE soldier's STORY. 

tlie pride they would feel when, some day, they shoiJd 
again stand under the old flag, true men, not traitors. 
I closed by saying, "I, too, am starving: it is the 
work of our enemies. You can see written all over me 
'Long imprisonment.' We are famishing, but let us 
show our enemies that we are not hirelings, but patriots ; 
that we can die, but will not be dishonored. Is there 
one here, after suffering for so glorious a cause, that 
will band himself with traitors ? " " No," " No," " No," 
"No," "Go on," "Go on," came the answers, like a pa^an 
of victory, from the lips of starving men — truly a vic- 
tory of truth over death. 

It was said some went out that night, after dark. I 
did not see them, and can only wonder that the desire 
for life was not strong enough to prompt more to go. 
Many, who had clamored to go, when the officer first 
made the proposition to them, came up to me, and, with 
tears, thanked me — thanked me for keeping food from 
their lips at such a price. Poor, noble fellows ! One 
of my company boys was among the number, and said, 
"It was the right kind of talk, Sarge ; " and tears 
streamed down his shrunken cheeks as he said, "I 
suppose I shall die before I get out ; but I had better, 
for I couldn't look mother or sis in the face after being 
a traitor." Poor, noble fellow ! he did die not a week 
from that day, and, as his pale face rises unbidden 
to memory, I can scarce but reproach myself that 
words of mine prevented him from saving life at even 
such a price. "My heart rose up in my throat," said 



A PICTUEESQUE OKATOR. 211 

another, "at thought of the Stars and Stripes, and I 
wouldn't go for a brigadier-general's commission in the 
Home Guards." 

Imagine me as an orator, clothed in picturesque rags. 
My wardrobe consisted of a pair of pants, remnants of 
a shirt, which hung in tatters from the neck-band, and 
an old torn hat, which looked like a letter A, rent by a 
dog. My pants were full of holes — so many mouths 
eloquent of misery. A decently-dressed, better-fed 
prisoner would not, perhaps, have aiFected my comrades 
by words so easily. It was because I was one of them, 
suiTering with them, that they listened so earnestly and 
responded so eloquently. Their hearts were right, and 
needed only a monitor. 

Sunday afternoons were holidays among the negroes 
of Charleston, and, dressed in their best "clo'es," they 
came to get a " peek " at the Yankees. They acted like 
overgrown children, and, when the Secesh artillerists 
pointed the guns towards them, as if to shoot, they ran 
screaming away. 

During the last of September, two citizen prisoners 
of our number went down Charleston Harbor on the 
rebel flag-of-truce boat, expecting to be paroled or 
exchanged. One of them was paroled, and, as no 
arrangements could be made for the disposal of the 
o^-her, he was brought back. In sight of the old flag 
and the friendly uniform, and then to be dragged again 
to an imprisonment which was to end — when or how 
no one knew — how great a disappointment ! The poor 



212 THE soldier's stoey. 

fellow pined away, lost courage, and soon died. Better 
for him had he never sailed down the harbor, with high 
hope of liberty, that pleasant morning. 

About this time it was rumored that the yellow fever 
had made its appearance in camp and in the city. But 
there were so many rumors continually in cii'culatiou 
among us, that we knew not what credence to give 
them. October came, and we were told that a removal 
of the prisoners would at once be commenced. A num- 
ber of cases of the yellow fever had occurred in town, 
and humanity, no less than the sanitary condition of the 
city, demanded our removal. I would have been will- 
ing to remain behind and take the risks, as, on the 
whole, our condition was liable to be worse at any 
other place than here. 

A detachment of prisoners was sent away the first of 
October, and about two thousand every two days contin- 
ued to be sent off, until the camp was cleared. On or 
about the seventh day, all the remaining squads of the 
prison, except the hospital department, were ordered to 
be ready to move on the morrow. About dark a pint 
of beans, a half pint of Indian meal, and a few spoon- 
fuls of rice were issued to each man, for three days' 
rations. We got no wood to cook it with. That even- 
ing Jesse and myself cut into small pieces the sticks 
used to raise our blanket on, and, obtaining lialf of a 
canteen to cook in, commenced to prepare our rations. 
First, we boiled the beans, — of course without salt or 
pork ; and, as we had no means of taking them with 



LUDICROUS mCIDENTS. 213 

US, and were hungry, ate them, for convenience and 
to keep them safe from pilferers. Then we boiled 
our rice, and, stirring up the Indian meal with it, 
cooked a johnny-cake in our canteen. All around us, 
gathered in anxious groups, were men engaged in sim- 
ilar occupations, and the casualties happening were 
curiously ludicrous. Men were continually falling into 
the shallow wells around them. It being the last night, 
the prisoners used such fuel as they had liberally, and 
indulged quite freely in pitch-pine torches. Every mo- 
ment or two might be heard a " chug " and splash, which 
proclaimed that some wandering star had fallen from 
its orbit into a well. The position was more vexing 
and comical than dangerous. I had been not a little 
amused at seeing others precipitated into wells, and had 
made up my mind that I would keep out of them. How 
fallible are all resolves ! While creeping on hands and 
knees, and not thinking of the proximity of wells, I 
was suddenly j)recipitated head foremost into one about 
six feet deep. Jesse caught me in the act of scrambling 
out, and, as I sat rubbing the sand out of my hau-, and 
trying to keep the water from running down my back, 
he commenced to poke fun at me. "Ben in bathin', 
old fellow ? Better stand on yer head, and let it drain 
off," said he, referring to the moisture, elevating his 
torch, so as to get a better view, and stepping back, 
chuckling. Suddenly, splash went something, and 
Jesse was invisible : he had disappeared into the recesses 
of the earth. It was then my turn to laugh. Thus 



214 THE soldier's story. 

we made merry over our misery, which, ordinarily, 
would have dampened the fun of most people. Was 
it not as well to laugh as cry ? 

The morning dawned, and found our rations cooked 
into a mysterious, black-looking substance, which 
we called a johnny-cake. We fell into line when 
the order came, in a hurry to see what fate and the 
Johnnies would do with us next. We were speedily 
marched to the northern entrance of the Fair Ground, 
where, after going through with a good deal of the usual 
counting, we were packed on board of box cars, and 
went slowly on our way in a northerly direction. 

As the cars were leaving Charleston we caught a 
glimpse of the Federal officers, who were embarked on 
board of box cars, en route, as I afterwards understood, 
for Columbia. Along on the railway, for quite a dis- 
tance out of Charleston, were families of white people, 
living in box cars, having then- beds, and kitchen fur- 
niture, and stoves therein. This I had noticed in all my 
transportations through Secessia. At Macon and other 
points it was quite as common as on the double and 
turn-out tracks near Charleston. 

Our route from Charleston to Florence was unmarked 
by extraordinary occurrences. There were several men 
shot by the guard, while trying to escape by jumping 
from the cars while in motion. At every stopping- 
place those of our number who had died during trans- 
portation were left along the route for burial. A dick- 
ering trade was kept up along the way between the 



ATTEMPT TO ESCAPE. 215 

guard, who were stationed on the top of the cars, 
and the prisoners. At one place where we stopped 
to wood up, while the vigilance of the guard was 
relaxed, I slyly got off the cars and crept under 
the platform of the depot, and was much chagrined 
when one of the Johnnies came along and stirred me 
out of my hiding-place, with admonitions to "git into 
them thar cars." 



216 THE soldier's story. 



CHAPTER XII . 

Imprisonment at Florence. — An affecting Scene. — Inhumanity of 
Rebel Authorities. — The Stockade similar to that at Andersonville 
— Precautions against Tunnelling. — Disrespect of Rebels to their 
Chief. — Poor Shelter. — Afterwards improved. — Suffering from 
Cold. — Scanty Rations. — Woodcutters detailed. — Dreadful An- 
noyance by Vermin. — PoUce organized under Big Peter. — The 
Force perverted to bad Purposes. — Despondency at the Pros- 
pects. — Further Attempts to purchase Treason. — Despair has its 
Effects. — An Apology for the poor Fellows. — Their Hope of Es- 
cape while in Rebel Service. — Some of them shot as Deserters. — 
Sublime Heroism. — Colonel Iverson again. — A Brutal Under 
officer. — Good News. — The Arrival of Clotliing. — A scanty 
Supply. — The Hospital flanked for a good Meal. — The Clouds 
breaking. — More Food. — Statement of Colonel Iverson that Food 
was limited by Orders. — Interest in Presidential Election. — Vote 
by Prisoners. — Majority for Lincoln. 

IT was pitch dark and raining furiously when we 
arrived at Florence, our destination. We were 
marched into a field, and took up our quarters among 
the hillocks, where had once been a cornfield. Water 
and mud combined to make the ground an uncomforta- 
ble bed that night. During the night a large number 
died. Willard Robinson, who had been complaining 
some few days, died that night M-hile lying under the 
same blanket with his father. The morning dawned, 
and the unhappy parent found his son lifeless by his side. 



TREATMENT OF THE DEAD. 217 

Smitten with grief, the father sat by the side of his dead 
boy, who had shared with him the perils of battle, and 
had been a companion in all the misfortunes and mis- 
eries of imprisonment. That father, who had more 
than once refused to purchase life by dishonor, would 
see that son no more. It was agonizing, but harder 
still the sequel. We went to the officer of the guard, 
and entreated for permission to bury the body. This 
poor boon for the father was refused. We then asked 
that the father might have the privilege of seeing him 
buried. This, too, was refused us. Their ears were 
deaf to the father's pleading — their eyes wer.e blinvl to 
his tearful sorrow. The father spread the poor remnants 
of his handkei-chief over the face of his dead son, folded 
his dear hands — it was all he could do. With a heart 
breaking with grief, he turned to leave him there, never 
to meet until the glory of a brighter morning should 
brino; them too^ether.* Not darin"' to look behind lest 
we should see rough hands stripping the dear body, we 
turned and commenced our march for the prison, — 
about a third of a mile distant. 

At last a " stockade " similar to that of Andersonville 
loomed up before us. We were marched through the 
gates, which were closed upon us, to be opened, perhaps, 
never again during life. We were assigned to a por- 
tion of the stockade, and set ourselves at work to better 
our condition. The prison, like that of Andersonville, 

* This was the last of several young boys who joined our company 
from the same New England village — South Scituate. 



218 THE soldier's story. 

was situated on two liiU-sides, with a branch of mudd)' 
water running tlu'ough the centre, embracing, in all, 
about twenty acres. To prevent tunnelling, on the 
outside a ditch was dug, the dirt from which was 
thro^vn against the stockade, forming a kind of walk 
around the entire prison, wliich brought the top of the 
stockade breast high to the sentinels, who constantly 
walked their posts. These sentinels did not seem to 
have the fear of Jeff or the Confederacy before their 
eyes, as, when at night the hourly cry Avent round, they 
often closed their "—o'clock, and all is well," with a 
poetical flourish of their own — "And old Jeff's gone 
to h — 1." "What regiment do you belong to?" I in- 
quired of one of them on the morning of my anival. 
"I belong to the fifth Georgia; Cheatham, he's our 
adjutant." I afterwards found out who Cheatham was 
— a comical, jolly grayback as ever graced the Con- 
federacy. 

Four others, with myself, formed a mess, and com- 
menced constructing a shelter. For this purpose we 
dug a hole in the hill-side, about three feet deep. Two 
sticks were then set into the ground, across which was 
tied a third for a ridge-pole. Over this was stretched 
an army blanket. The front and rear ends, of course, 
were open, as we had nothing with which to stop them 
up. When it rained, we sometimes stopped up one 
end with our garments. In this grave-like place four 
human beings lodged, kept their "traps," and called it 
their home. We found sufficient wood for cookuigr 



SUFFERING FROM COLD. 219 

purposes by peeling the bark from the stumps of tiees, 
while those who had the implements cut and dug at the 
stumps for fuel. A week or two after my arrival, I 
obtained permission to go outside the prison under 
guard, and get material for completing our apology 
for a tent, and returned rejoicing with as much un- 
trinuued pine brush as I could drag. We stripped 
off the pine pins, and put them in at the bottom of 
our shelter, making a very aristoci"atic bed, which few 
in prison enjoyed. We then patched up the rear of 
our "shebang" with pine limbs, which made altogether 
quite comfortable quarters, compared with what we had 
formerly enjoyed. But we needed all this, and more 
too, to make up for want of circulation and vitality in 
our scurvy-stricken bodies, and for the inclemency of a 
South Carolina winter, which, however sunny the South 
is said to be, was very cold. I never suffered more 
with cold than at this time. The days were usually 
quite warm, but, from sundown to ten o'clock in the 
morning, it was, to our poorly clad, emaciated bodies, 
bitterly cold. My clothes, which I have before de- 
scribed, were full of holes, and my feet were bare. 
The frost in the mornings was like snow on the ground, 
and often, through fear of freezing or being chilled to 
death, barefooted men walked up and down the prison 
all night, longing, through intense suffering, for morn- 
ing to come. Often, in the dead hours of midnight, I 
walked the frosty ground, pierced with the sharp winds 
which mercilessly sought out every hole in my scanty 



220 THE soldier's story. 

wardrobe, and the next day took my revenge by sleep- 
ing in the sunshine to make up for lost sleep. 

From the day of my arrival in camj), I commenced 
making use of hard wood ashes and water to clean and 
rinse my mouth, and soon had the satisfaction to k.iow 
that it was counteracting the effects of scui'vy. Our 
rations at this place were as scanty as at Charleston. 
Our divisions for the issue of rations were the same. 
In no place did prisoners suffer so intensely, and yet in 
no prison Avas the commanding officer so inclined to 
make us comfortable. Nothing, however, short of a 
complete change in their mode of living could now. 
benefit the majority of prisoners. A large number 
of men, after a few Aveeks, were paroled to remain 
outside the prison dming the day to cut wood for the 
use of the camp, Avliile our police were urged by the 
colonel commanding into building log shelters for those 
of the sick who could not help themselves, and made 
to keej) the prison quite clean and orderly. 

As it was impossible to obtain water Avithout going 
into the mud and water over knee before getting to the 
branch or brook which was the only supply of the 
prison, there Avere men Avho made a business of obtain- 
ing Avater for others, the common fee for so doing being 
a " chaw of tobacco." " Who Avants a pail or canteen 
of water for a chaAV of tobacco?" Avas as common a 
clamor as "Have a hack?" "HaA^e a hack?" at our 
metropolitan railroad stations. Near, the brook a hun- 
dred or more men would be gathered, who would feel 



ANNOYiVXCE FEOM VERMIN. 221 

repaid for half a day's waiting, wading, &c., with one 
or two diminutive chews of tobacco. Sometimes might 
be seen men around camp seUing the proceeds of these 
labors for rations. 

During the summer we had been annoyed with flies, 
mosquitos, fleas, and all such kindred plagues. As 
cold weather advanced, we got clear of these ; but a 
greater annoyance set in, little dreamed of. The ver- 
min, not troublesome in warm weather, now, as the 
cold set in, took the benefit of the warmth of our 
bodies, swarming from our blankets and the ground 
upon our persons. Night or day there was no peace 
with them ; they would not be still. Scratching only 
pleased them ; for, where the skin was once started, 
they went to work eating into the flesh. The results 
were frightful, loathsome sores. I have seen sick per- 
sons whose flesh was eaten almost to the bone. I can- 
not, however, say whether the vermin ate the flesh, or 
only produced the irritation followed by scratching, 
which may have caused the sores. However disgust- 
ing such details, it is necessary that I should record 
them in order that the general reader may understand 
our condition. 

At Florence the police organization, as I have inti- 
nated, was again revived under Big Peter as "chief of 
police." Their ofiices consisted in seeing to the police 
duties of the camp, guarding against the perpetration 
of nuisances, constructing shelter, procuring fuel for 
those not able to help themselves, and the carrying out 



22-2 THE soldier's story. 

of the dead. Under these arrangements, the carnp 
became clean and orderly, wood was more regularly 
divided and dealt out, and the dead cared for more 
decently than before. There can be no disj)uting 
that they accomplished much good. But even this 
organization was perverted into a tool of the rebels 
for detecting the work on tunnels, and punishing those 
who dug them by thirty stripes upon the bare back 
with a cat-o'-nine-tails. " Big Pete " becoming pros- 
trated with a fever, a gigantic, ignorant brute, with 
neither the good sense, good humor, nor the disposi- 
tion to deal justly, which were characteristic of Peter, 
took his place as " chief of police," and under his 
misrule cowardly acts were perpetrated upon prisonci's. 
Those who incurred the displeasure of the rebels, or 
their tool, the " chief," were tied to a whipping-post, 
and were mercilessly punished upon the bare back 
with that classic instrument, a cat-o'-nine-tails. Ser- 
geant English, of a New York regiment, had once 
been instrumental in bringing this big brute before 
the prison tribunal at Andersonville for the murder 
of one of his company or regimental boys. On some 
trivial excuse, the chief brought Sergeant English to 
the whipping-post, and, before even a form of trial 
was through with, and while yet his hands Avere j3in- 
ioned behind him, struck him repeatedly in the face 
with his clinched fist. It was only through the 
instrumentality of Lieutenant Barrett, of the prison, 
that he got a trial, and, nothing being proved against 



TAJMPEEING WITH PEISONERS. 223 

him, he was released. Sergeant English then said he 
would have justice ; and I only wonder that S. has 
never since been brouo;ht to trial for his brutal outrajjes 
against prisoners. 

In November the cold became so intense, our rations 
so inadequate for the maintenance of health, the pros- 
pects of an exchange before the close of the war so 
vague, and the chances for life so uncertain, that the 
strongest heart recoiled at thoughts of the future. 
Broken in health and spirits, they cast despairingly 
around them in search of some means by which to 
escape from the impending doom wliich threatened 
them. Terrible were those days and nights of torture 
and death, from which there seemed no release. Most 
of the prisoners whose heax-ts had been buoyed so long by 
hope of exchange, parole, or deliverance by raids, now 
sank in despondency. Taking advantage of this hope- 
lessness among prisoners, a recruiting station for the 
Confederate army Avas opened near the stockade, the 
officers of which came into prison for recruits. There 
were some among us so hopeless, so lost to every 
feeling but hunger, that they bartered their honor for 
food, and took the oath of allegiance to the detested 
Confederacy. Let those who blame them consider that 
these men had been suffering the torments of Anderson- 
ville, Belle Island, Salisbury, Charleston, and Millen, 
for many dreary months, and now before them was a 
hopeless winter, without clothes to cover their naked- 
ness, food sufficient to preserve health, or blankcLs 



224 THE soldier's story. 

to wrap themselves iu at night. Some, considering 
an oath taken at such a time not binding, went out 
only to risk their lives in an escape. Jimmy, a boy 
about fifteen years of age, had no blanket or cooking 
utensils. He was continually obliged to beg for the 
use of them from some one more fortunate. In his 
destitution, he had to walk nights to keep from being 
chilled completely through, which, with men in prison, 
was usually followed by death. His life was crowded 
Avith inexpressible misery. For weeks brave Jimmy 
endured these miseries. He had refused at Charleston 
to go out and work ; but at last the tempter prevailed : 
he went out, took the oath, had enough to eat for one 
week, and was shot, it was said, while trying to escape 
the next. 

Many died rather than stain their lips with the 
dishonor of such an oath. D. P. Robinson, whom I 
have twice before mentioned, had it urged upon him 
thus to save his life. His answer was, "My boy is 
dead. I shall go with the boy." Simple words, yet 
heroic. "Death rather than dishonor" has been sub- 
limely uttered by orators and novelists, but never was 
its import so heroically realized as in many instances 
like those daily occurring in prison. I was, however, 
sometimes grieved to see men in comparatively good 
healtli going out to take the oath, men who possessed 
a blanket or overcoat. N. L. and A. H., men of my 
battalion, were of this number, in spite of promises 
made to me a few moments before. When my back 



GREAT HEROISM. 225 

was turned they went out to the recruiting office. So 
great was the indignation of the prisoners at the con- 
duct of such men, that the rebels had continually to 
protect them by a guard. The rebels had no respect 
for them, and distinguished them from the genuine gray- 
backs by the significant term of "Galvanized Yanks." 
It was true that a few under terrible suffering, with 
death looking them in their faces, took the oath as the 
last hope of life. Yet I cannot but be amazed at the 
general constancy with which starving men repudiated 
such conduct while surrounded by suffering and death. 
There are but few instances recorded where men 
exposed to such temptations so resolutely acted, suf- 
fered, and died for the right. 

The hero who gives his life for a cause, while shouts 
of comrades cheer his heart, thrilling with grand emo- 
tions, is looked upon with admiration. But he who 
suffers gradual starvation, temptation, and despair, for 
many, many weary months, and at last seals his devo- 
tion with death, is he not the truest hero? Many a 
one lies to-day in his prison grave, which bears no 
name or mark to tell how he died, or what he suffered, 
or how true he was to the cause for which he renounceci 
home, happiness, and life ; but a grateful nation will 
recognize and remember in coming time the devotion 
which has done so much to perpetuate and preserve 
national life and honor. 

Lieutenant-Colonel Iverson was in command of the 
prison, and a lieutenant named Barrett had the sup er- 
15 



22 G THE soldier's story. 

vision of its interior. He was a rough, green, conceited 
brute, who never spoke without blasphemy, and never 
gave a civil word, or did a kind deed for any prisoner 
— a man with as few of the elements of good in liis 
nature as I ever knew. I have always wondered that 
a man like Iverson tolerated such a coarse brute. 
I cannot account for it unless I take as an explanation 
an expression which I once heard him utter : " Barrett 
is just rough enough to scare the Yankees, and make 
them stand round." It was a task Iverson was too 
kind-hearted to take upon himself. Iverson paroled 
eight hundred men to cut wood for the prison, and 
continually urged upon our police, to whom he gave 
extra rations, the building of shelter, &c., for the 
destitute. But this took time, and meanwhile hundreds 
were dying. It was not life, it was mere existence. 

From the time I made my escape from Anderson- 
ville I was troubled with aching limbs, which, after my 
release, terminated in paralysis of my legs, and left 
side, from which, I have not as yet recovered suf- 
ficiently to walk without a crutch. 

About the first of November came the joyful an- 
nouncement that clothes had arrived from Charleston, 
sent by our Sanitary Commission. The excitement 
among the prisoners was very great, and a hundred 
at a time were marched to the prison entrance, to be 
inspected and supplied according to their merits of 
raggedness. But the supply was inadequate to make 
us anything like comfortable. Some poor creatures, 



SCANTT SUPPLY OF CLOTHING. 227 

who for months had been without blanket or coat, 
got one, robed themselves in it straightway, and 
lay down, as if they had reached lit last their idea} 
of comfort. The police did much to distribute these 
articles of clothing where they justly belonged. I 
had no shirt. Some shreds simply, hanging from the 
neck-band, proclaimed that my person had once rejoiced 
in such an article. I had no shoes, and holes formed 
the principal part of my breeches. All my ingenuity 
could not make my wardrobe break joints to cover my 
nakedness. Yet there were so many worse off than 
myself ihat I was justly overlooked until the last. 
When it became certain that no more urgent cases 
were to be supplied, then I got a cotton shirt. This 
I was, lucky enough to swap for a red flannel one, in 
the possession of which I was positively happy for a 
time. 

Somewhere near this period the south-west corner of 
the stockade was separated from the main prison for a 
hospital. Here rude barracks were built, and outsiders, 
n( t regularly admitted, were kept out by a police force 
detailed from the prison. Once I escaped their keen 
eyes, and flanked into the hospital, where a friend gaxo 
me such a stomacliful of wheat bread and sweet potato 
soup that its very remembrance gladdened me for 
weeks. Thus slowly the clouds began to break, and 
luck turned in my favor. There were men in pi'ison 
who bought four or five sweet potatoes of the rebel 
sutler, and, cooking them, sold enoigh to buy again, 



228 THE SOIDIER's STORY. 

and get one for themselves. One morning I drew In 
dian meal for my ration, and traded it for a sweet 
potato. This was not so much in bulk as the half pint 
of meal, but the potato seemed to do me more good ; 
and thereafter, when I could, I traded off my rations 
for sweet potatoes, under which diet, and my habit of 
daily bathing, if I did not gain strength, I managed to 
keep Avhat little I had. Sergeant Charles Stone, of a 
Maine regiment, gave me at this time about a dozen 
potatoes. I shared them Avith comrades, and as the 
irrepressible Jess described it afterwards, "The way 
we walked into those potatoes " would have made the 
reader smile to behold. 

At one time officers came into the prison, covertly 
buying greenbacks of the prisoners. As they went out 
of prison. Colonel Iverson caused them to be arrested, 
seized upon the greenbacks, and devoted the money so 
obtained to buying potatoes for the sick prisoners. I 
state these facts fi'om a sense of justice towards a mau 
who showed consideration for prisoners. Though Iver- 
son did harsh things through his red-headed brute tool, 
Barrett, such as hanging men by the thumbs, &c., in 
the main he intended to deal justly by the prisoners, 
which had been unusual in my prison experience. He 
once stated to me that the men would get more food if 
he was not positively limited by the quantity and quality 
issued to him for that purpose. He could issue no more 
than he had. 

Before the presidential election at the Nortli, the reb- 



INTEREST IN THE PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION. 229 

els evinced intense interest in its result. They were 
anxious for McClellan's election over Lincoln, or, at 
least, for Lincoln's defeat. To test the sentiments of the 
prisoners, and thus form some estimate of the manner 
the States v^ould go in the pending election, on the day 
of election two bags were placed on the inside of the 
stockade. Those who were in favor of Lincoln were 
to put a black bean into a bag, and those for McClellan 
were to vote white beans, which were provided for this 
purpose. We were marched by hundreds, and depos- 
ited our ballots. It was understood that if a majority 
of votes were cast for Little Mac, we should get extra 
rations that day. The result of the ballot was about 
fifteen hundred for McClellan and six thousand for 
Lincoln. There were about ten thousand men in the 
camp, but all did not vote. The rebels were disap- 
pointed at the result. When the vote was declared, the 
prisoners gathered at the place of election, cheering 
and singing patriotic songs, and Colonel Iverson for- 
bade their being interrupted. 



230 THE soldier's story. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

Philosophy of Humor in Suffering. — Natural for Men to seek for 
Sunlight. — Smiles and Tears. — Lightness of Heart. — Jesse L. 
a Sample. — His comical Demeanor. — Jess as a Pair of Bellolrs. 
— A queer Remark. — Dealing out Rations. — All Eyes on the 
Meal-bag. — Squeezing the Haversack. — Eyes big with Hunger. — 
Jesse's Tactics. — Raising the black Flag. — More Truth than Po- 
etry. — Jack E. — Herbert Beckwith. — Jess cooking under Diffi- 
culties. — Scurvy. — Combination of Disease, &c. — Torturing 
Memories. — Character developed by Suffering. — Artliur H. 
Smith. — A Break. — Death of Comrades. — A Political Creed. — 
Escape by Bribery. — Coincidences. — Instances of them. — De- 
cember, 1864. — A Call for Clerks. — Colonel Iverson's Surprise. 

UNDER the circumstances described in the forego- 
ing chapters, it may seem to the general reader 
inconsistent with human nature that those ho situated 
should see and realize anything like the grotesque and 
humorous in the kind of life Avhich, as prisoners, we 
endured. This is true as applying to the many ; but 
gleams of wit and fun were all the more striking when 
contrasted with the dark background of prison misery. 
In reading these pages, it may sometimes appear to 
critical readers, that the autlior has exhibited too great 
a disposition to indulge in levity or humorous delinea- 
tions, to satisfy them that he was, after all, so great a 
sufferer, and that the horrors of prison life, as depicted, 



PHILOSOPHY IN SUFTEEING. 231 

were not overdrawn, or, at least, exceptional in their 
application. Human nature remains the same under 
all conditions, and, though modified by circumstances, 
must act itself out, strange though some of its phases 
may appear. Humanity is complex and curious as a 
study, especially when seen under extraordinary cir- 
cumstances, where the conventional courtesies of eti- 
quette, which mask the character of most men in the 
common conditions of society, are dropped, or cast aside 
unknowingly from its features. 

There is a physical and mental disposition, common 
among most men, when their condition is overcast b}'' 
the gloomy shadows of misery and want, to seek foi 
and enjoy some ray of the sunshine to which they may 
have been accustomed, however little there may be. 
So, in our prison sufferings, if we could sometimes get 
glimpses of anything like, or even suggestive of, the sun- 
hght of other and better circumstances, amid the gloom 
of our squalidness, we were inclined to enjoy and 
appreciate it, though the elements from which tho 
gayety or humor would be produced, were often, per- 
haps, more properly causes of agonizing tears than 
of hilarity or glee. Lamentations and laughter, min- 
gling together, as is frequently seen in children, were 
phenomena sometimes witnessed among the prisoners. 
In this manner the one element mitigated the keenness 
of mental and physical sufferings produced by the 
other, without which, often, the one, if not beyond en- 
durance, would have proved much harder to bear. In 



232 THE soldier's story. 

^his way Nature sometimes kindly tempers the wind< 
of adverse circumstances to the shorn lambs of wretch- 
edness. There are several causes contributing to pro- 
duce this condition of mind, but first among them is 
the disposition to make the best of one's circumstances, 
practicalizing the old adage, "It is no use to cry for 
spilt milk." 

All reflective minds seem intuitively to assume that 
nothing can be gained by taking gloomy views of un- 
happy circumstances, over which they have no control ; 
that it is better to be merry than sad ; better the laugh 
should well up from a sinking heart than to give ex- 
pression to groans of despondency, for these outward 
expressions are oftentimes instrumental in producing a 
joyous or saddened condition of mind. To one whom 
Nature has gifted with much buoyancy or lightness of 
heart, who has, perhaps, a keen appreciation of the 
ridiculous, there are no cu'cumstances where the com- 
binations of the ludicrous are so often possible as in the 
midst of the most extreme misery. There seems, amid 
such scenes, to be but one step from the tragic to the 
laughable, and the transition is so readily and easily made 
from the one to the other, without change of scenery 
or character, that feelings of mirthfulness and lamenta- 
tions not unfrequently mingle in the same utterances. 
This is, seemingly, typical of their relations, and sym- 
bolizing the narrow division which, once overstepped on 
either side, readily produces either of the two extremes. 
The squalid and ill-conditioned cu-cumstances of the 



OPPOSITES OF CHARACTER. 233 

peasantry of Ireland seem to have given them a love 
for drollery and an appreciation of the humors, conceits, 
and vagaries which will often spring up and group 
themselves around great poverty. 

There were usually two opposites of character con- 
tinually mingling together in prison, one borrowing 
gloom from the future, the other more hopeful, with 
tendencies constantly uppermost to laugh at the ridic- 
ulous and comical, seen gleaming through the clouds 
of despondent wretchedness. Blessed was he who re- 
tained this happy disposition ; who, forgetful, for the 
moment, of himself, could still find in his heart the 
elements of mirth and humor. It increased his chances 
of life, when others, of opposite mould of character, were 
almost sure to die. Jesse L. whom I have more than 
once alluded to in this narrative, was a fine sample of 
this phase of character — a man whom no amount of 
suffering from short rations and cold could dampen or 
dismay. If he ever entertained serious thoughts, he 
kept them to himself, or made them known in so droll 
a manner as to make one laugh in spite of hunger and 
other miseries. A certain comical grimness in his phys- 
iognomy was heightened by a dirty face, where, per- 
haps, a few tears, shed over others' misfortunes, or a 
smoky fire, had worked lines of queer and grotesque 
import, which an artist's pencil rarely could have imi- 
tated or excelled. On one momentous occasion, when 
a dish of mush trembled in the balance and was found 
wanting, for the need of fire to cook it, Jess desper- 



234 THE soldier's story. 

ately turned himself into a pair of bellows . and, tha? 
engaged, blew about all the strength and wind out of 
his half-starved body, until, at last, despairing of ob- 
taining any flame, he looked up, coughed, and, with an 
inimitable grimace, said, "Look 'ere, Sarge ; just help 
me — can't you?" Seeing how fruitless he had been in 
developments, I modestly disclaimed having any ability 
in the blowing line. "Well," said Jess, winking and 
coughing with smoke, "you might put one hand on my 
stomach and the other on my back, and squeeze a little 
more wind out of me at that smoke." 

The dealing out of rations for a squad of twenty 
men was an interesting daily performance, spiced with 
hunger and an anxiety on the part of each to get as 
much if not more than his comrades. On such occa- 
sions, in my squad Jesse usually officiated with a 
spoon, dealing around, in regular order, one spoonful 
of meal and then another, until it was all given out. 
At times it of course overran more than even spoon- 
fuls to the whole, sometimes half of us getting one more 
than the rest. This was equalized by commencing to 
deal out the rations where, on the day previous, they 
left off giving the extra spoonful. Each man had a 
number, by which, at ration time, he was known. Dur- 
ing such a performance, the meal-bag, or haversack, 
was the focus of all the twenty eyes interested in its 
fair distribution. Dead silence reigned throughout the 
squad. More solemnity and anxiety could not have 
been infused into any other transaction of our life than 



DEALING OP RATIONS. 235 

was given to this matter, so near our hearts. Great 
interest was usually shown in having the bag, or haver- 
sack, in which was contained the meal, well shaken and 
scraped of its contents. One day the flour which was 
issued went but little over three heaping spoonfuls 
apiece, and hungry eyes were turned to that common 
centre, the meal-bag. Jesse turned the haversack, 
shook it, and scraped it with desperation, knitting his 
brow, then, looking grimly around on each silent, anx^ 
ious face, with a twitch at the corners of his mouth, 
and in a snuffling tone said, "Boys, yer eyes won't 
have to be very big to be bigger than your bellies, if 
they feed us this 'ere fashion long." 

At another time some hungry customers persisted in 
critically examining the bag (after Jess had got himself 
into a sweat in scraping it until not a speck remained 
which would have proved a temptation to a pismire), 
to see that it contained no more meal. Jess threw the 
bag towards them, remarking, "If yer can look any 
meal inter that 'ere bag, I wish you'd give a look inter 
my stomach ! " 

As winter advanced, in common with other prisoners, 
Jess experienced great trouble from those tormentors 
of our flesh, the vermin. Almost continually during 
the day he had his nether garment off, engaged in a 
war of extermination, when, as he expressed it, he 
raised the black flag, and gave " no quarters " to the 
enemy. Drury, a quizzical fellow of our acquaintance, 
came upon the busy Jess thus engaged, and remarked, 



236 THE soldier's story. 

"Now, old feller, you seem to be at them about all 
your time." "Yes," said Jess, suspending operations 
for a while, to scratch his back, "it's a pooty even 
thing; me and these fellers take turns." "How so?" 
inquired D. "Why," quietly remarked Jess, with a 
droll snuffle, "I torment them all day, and they torment 
me all night!" "In that remark, O Jess, was con- 
densed more vigorous truth than poetical licence,^' re- 
marked D., as he walked away, leaving the undaunted 
Jess still "at um." 

Damon, another comrade of mine, shared, in common 
with the rest of us, a very spare diet. One day, after 
being diligently engaged in compressing his pantaloons 
around him, in order to keep them on, for the want of 
suspenders for that essential purpose, with a long-drawn 
sigh, shook his head, and remarked, "There's one con- 
solation : if I keep on growing slim in this way, there'll 
be cloth enough in this pair of breeches to make two 
pairs, which wUl give me a chance for winter." The 
idea was so amusing that laughter was irrepressible. 

On another occasion I noticed my hungry comrade 
Beckwith eating a suspicious-looking substance, which 
bore a close resemblance to raw dough, rather than 
bread. "What, Beck., eating your flour raw?" I iu- 
quu'ed, just to see what he would say. "Kaw? Yes ! " 
exclaimed he, with mingled tones of indignation and 
humor ; " I shouldn't wonder if 'twas just the thing to 
stick to my ribs and make me fat." Thus it was that 
starving, suffering men, while battling for life, Liughed 



HBMOE AMID WEETCHEDNESS. 237 

At fate, and threw their jokes in the face of i'amhie and 
wretchedness. 

On first entering the Florence prison I saw Beckwith 
ahnost daily. He always met me with the same brave 
smile, and with a quick, merry sparkle of his fine blue 
eye. I remember his jocular expression used to be, 
when we met, "Hey, old boy ! what der you think of 
this — don't you? Tall living, perhaps you believe." 
But there came a change : his steps grew more and 
more feeble ; his blue eyes looked their merry smile no 
more. He lived to reach Annapolis, and died without 
the longed-for sight of loved friends and home, where 
and among whom he had hoped to lie down and be at 
rest. Brave comrade ! poor fellow ! farewell ! No 
more shall loved ones gaze upon thy merry, soul-lit 
face ; no more will ring thy light, full-hearted laugh. 

How many faces, like his, pale with dreadful suffer- 
ing, come up like ghosts in households throughout the 
land, bringing to anguished hearts wails of bitterness 
and sorrow, which nothing can heal in this life ! How 
hard the task, among our northern homes, to forget or 
forgive those who committed the crimes which merci- 
lessly starved and tortured helpless men and youth, 
sent from every village of the land ! At Anderson ville, 
Florence, Charleston, and Belle Isle, their bones ara 
an attestation of a stain which no future can ever wash 
from the garments of the Soutli. 

I one day found Jack E. intently engaged in stretch- 
ing the remnants of an old shirt across two mud walls, 



238 THE soldier's story. 

built up like a dog kennel, leaving a space between 
almost large enough to admit t\A'o persons when lying 
down. Jack was whistling away, as though Avell satis- 
fied with the manner in which things were progressing, 
when I remarked that I couldn't see the use of the ohl 
shirt, as it would neither keep out cold, wind, or rain. 
"AVell," said Jack, stopping suddenly in his whistling, 
with a puzzled gaze fixed on his " shebang," then look- 
ing up, with a triumphant grin, " I don't suppose it 
will ; but won't it strain some of the coarsest of it ? " 

During a rainy spell at Florence, at one time it 
became almost impossible to start a fire, and wood 
produced, at best, little besides smoke. The persistent 
Jess, under these circumstances, was indefatigable in 
his efforts to choke down the smoke and blow up the 
fire. Being defeated time after time, at last persever- 
ance was rewarded. The little fire blazed, and Jess's 
face glowed with eager satisfaction as he held extended 
over the coals a split canteen, containing a concoction 
of flour and water, which the poor fellow's stomach was 
sorely in need of. He was at the height of satisfael ion , 
when some clmnsy fellow, in passing, stumbled and 
fell, putting out the fire, and sitting in the identical 
canteen, and on the contents of which poor Jess had 
centred his ambition and appetite. AVith one blow the 
prospects of Jess for a supper and a fire had disaj)- 
peared. The strain on his nerves was toe much ; he 
burst into tears, and from tears to a discordant wail of 
chagrin, disappointment, and hunger. But, seeing iho 



EXTRE3IE WRETCHEDNESS. 239 

destroyer of his hopes, Venus-like, rising from a small 
8ea of paste, his sense of the ludicrous was awakened, 
and Jess, bursting from a howl of sorrow and dismay 
to laughter, exclaimed, " Old fellow, if you'll set over 
that fire till it bakes, I'll go halves with you." 

It was often piteous to see men struggling with de- 
spondency, hunger, and cold, in an attempt to preserve 
life. ^len whose half-clad bodies were chilled through 
were to be seen moving feebly around during the night, 
uttering agonizing wails and moans, in an attempt to 
keep up circulation, and retain life in their wasted 
bodies. I recollect some half a dozen naked forms, 
out of which the likeness of human beings had been 
starved, with chattering teeth, groping around in 
prison, without a shirt to their backs, their gaze idiotic, 
and their speech confused and incoherent. Staggering 
feebly, they fell and died by the brook-side and in the 
sloughs of the quagmire, or by the dead-line. All hu- 
man language fails to depict these scenes, and their 
very remembrance chills my blood with horror. 

No imagination can picture the wretchedness of the 
hospital at the camp. Not one half of its inmates had 
their senses ; their bodies begrimed with dirt, their limbs 
swelled and discolored with scurvy, or covered with the 
filth of diarrhoea, they lay often on the bare ground, in 
the rain, without shelter or blanket to cover their naked- 
ness. Could the scenes occurring in prison be de- 
picted and understood by the North in all their horror, 
the spirit of revenge would, I fear, have been aroused, 



240 THE soldier's story. 

and have gone forth in a war of retaliation and exter 
mination against the South. How hard, alas ! it is to 
comprehend scenes of wretchedness which elsewhere 
have no known parallel in the history of suffering men. 

1 have never seen a description given of the effects 
upon the human system of a meagre diet of entirely 
one kind of food. At Florence no vegetable food was 
ever issued, or meat, with three exceptional cases, to 
any but the hospital inmates. Our rations had more 
variety than we obtained at Andersonville, usuidly con- 
sisting of wheat flour, hominy, rice, or Indian meal. 
Dr. Hamlin, in his learned dissertation on Anderson- 
ville, assumes that to the scarcity of food were entirely 
owing those aggravated forms of scui'vy- ^\'ith which the 
prison was reeking. This, no doubt, contributed in 
producing them, by weakening the system and giving 
less power to the body to throw off the influence of dis- 
ease ; but, in my opinion, it was the entire absence 
of vegetable food, together with want of variety, which 
caused such unusually dreadful cases of scurvy. 

The tendency of scurvy to bring out old diseases, 
and to reproduce and render chronic any weakness to 
which the system had a previous tendency, is also, I 
think, but little understood, as one of its effects. I be- 
lieve the diarrhoea in camp, which, in a majority of 
cases, produced death, was only one of the aggravations 
of this disease, seizing upon that portion of the phys- 
ical system which was weakest. Scurvy in the mouth 
produced scurvy in the bowels, which was followed by 



COMBINATIONS OF DISEASE. 241 

a general disorder of those functions. Old diseases, 
which were supposed to be eradicated, were revived by 
its influences, such was its tendency to seize upon the 
weaknesses of the system. I have of these matters, it is 
irue, no scientific knowledge ; but, having been witness 
to its workings in thousands of cases, I merely make 
the statement as a result of my observations on the 
isubject. 

It was true that starvation and mental despondency 
blended with so many forms of physical horror as to 
make it difficult to trace the distinct action of any par- 
ticular disease. At Florence, as at Andersonville, the 
combination of them all produced feeble-mindedness 
and often insanity, which never partook in their char- 
acter of fierceness, but were rather characterized by 
timidity of demeanor and incoherence of speech, in 
which often were mingled piteous tones of entreaty, 
low and tremulous with weakness ; sometimes gleams 
of intelligence lighting the stony eye, or thrilling the 
voice with a wail of hopeless despair. No pen can 
picture or language express it ; only those who are fa- 
miliar, to their sorrow, with these scenes, will recognize 
the full import of my meaning. I seldom recall, will- 
ingly, these pictures of wretchedness ; but they are too 
indelibly impressed upon memory, by the fierce brand 
of suffering, to be forgotten. Those sad, wailing 
voices, those clutching, restless hands, those pinched, 
despairing or meaningless faces, — all unbidden come 
back to me, with the horror of reality. Perhaps it 
16 



242 THE soldier's stoey. 

mifflit be better to let such memories slumber in tlieii 
prison homes ; but they seem to rise reproachfully, and 
bid me speak. I am almost glad that language fails to 
convey half my meaning, for the hearts of parents and 
kindred would freeze with terror could they but see 
those loved ones in all their hopeless wretchedness. 

Revenge is not tolerated in the light of our high, en- 
nobling civilization; but when I behold the South, 
stricken and suffering from fire, famine, and the sword, 
as one of the results of the awful civil contest just 
closed, I seem to see the hand of God's retribution 
seekino; out and visitino; her crimes with chastisement. 
If in coming times, as in the past, she shall sin against 
the moral ideas of the age, or if we, as then, become 
participants in her crime, so shall we reap, with her, 
the punishment of those crimes. 

There was a phase of character developed by prison 
life which was neither joyous nor sad in its outward 
expression, seemingly a quiet bracing of every nerve, 
and the concentration of all the powers of mind and 
body against disease and death, in which men neither 
laughed, nor smiled, nor cried, nor could anything move 
them from their impervious calmness of demeanor. Not 
even an exciting rumor of exchange, or prospect of 
speedy deliverance, seemed to start them from theii 
impenetrable placidity. Imbued with a quiet inflex- 
ibleness of purpose, — and that to live, — they calcu- 
lated every chance of life in each moment of time, yet 
never seemed to feel disappointment or passion. Like 



DETERMINATION TO LIVE. 243 

a rack in mid-ocean, lashed by the storm, they stood 
unmoved by the passions and longings that swayed and 
actuated the great mass of tortured mortality. I recall 
to mind one of this mould of character. 

A comrade informed me one morning that S. was 
dying. I visited him, and found him suffering great 
bodily pain ; but not an expression of it disturbed the 
calmness of his face. It was simply in the vice-like 
compression of his lips, and the convulsion of his limbs, 
that could be detected his great suffering. His hands 
were poor and wasted, seeming to be, simply, a parched 
skin drawn over angular bones. "Do you think you 
will live through it?" I asked of him. "Yes, I know 
I shall live as long as any one who does not get more 
rations than I do." 

I did not believe him at the time ; but, in spite of 
my unbelief, he lived, and is living still. He had a 
philosophy of his own in economizing life. He did not 
allow any passion or excitement to use up his vitality. 
He had a system of exercise, and, seemingly, was 
engrossed with profound reflections on his condition, 
studying himself and his circumstances to solve the 
problem of how he could best prolong life. I once 
asked him if he got down-hearted at the jDrospects. His 
reply was an index to his character : " No — there 'd be 
]io use in that ; " as if his inflexible will controlled even 
Ihe action of his mind, in that one purpose of living. 
Men of this iron mould were rare. It is uncommon, 
indeed, as a phenomenon, to see one possessing such 



244 THE soldier's story. 

stoical determination, such steady, unfaltering nerves, 
while battling for a foothold on life. 

Sergeant Arthur H . Smith was a man who had some- 
thing of this composition. Always quiet, determined, 
and undemonstrative, he took the hardships of prison 
life with dogged grimness of purpose, — as if to extract 
all the life there was from the food to be had, and 
infuse it into bone and muscle, for purposes of endur- 
ance. It was this calm, ceaseless persistence and inflex- 
ible purpose which were requisite qualities for carrying 
men tlu'ough the quicksands of death which surrounded 
us. When Smith first came to Florence, he was sent 
out to gather wood for the prison. The guards did not 
have their muskets loaded that day, and, had they been, 
they were nearly as liable to go oft' the wrong end as 
the right one. Noticing all these facts. Smith com- 
menced to organize "for a break." Suddenly, to the 
surprise of the Johnnies, about half of their prisoners 
filed quietly in another direction, as if acting under 
orders ; and so I suppose they were — from Smith. By 
the time the grayback sentinels began to understand 
the Yankee trick, the prisoners mentioned had scattered 
in all directions through the woods, and were not atten- 
tive to the repeated invitation of then- guardian gTay- 
backs to " halt, thar ! " It must have shocked the 
Johnnies' ideas of propriety to see the Yanks scamper- 
ing off with so little notice. Smith was out on the 
"rampage" two or three weeks, but was finally cap- 
tured in the vicinity of Wilmington. He had found 



EFFECTS OF DESPAIE. 245 

friends among the black men, evidence of which he 
carried on his person, in the shape of some increase of 
flesh, and in a full suit of coarse gray clothes, and a 
shirt, made, I should think, from an old carpet. He 
came into prison with the same stoical demeanor and 
persistence of purpose standing out in his face — that 
of living and enduring to get home ; which, it is need- 
less to say, he achieved. He was my companion from 
Annapolis to Massachusetts, and lives to-day, shattered 
in health; but not shaken in the resolution to live as long 
as possible. 

Sergeant Attwood, another comrade, was a man of 
opposite tendencies, with something of changefulness in 
his moods and disposition. He was, perhaps, as noble- 
hearted and brave a fellow as ever stood at a gun. 
Elated or depressed easily by good news or the reverse, 
his was not the temperament to endure the horrors of 
prison life. He sank under it, and, I believe, died at 
last amid the despondency and gloom of the prison. 

Baxter, of Company G, went the same way, though 
he got his parole, and was on his way North. Shat- 
tered in mind and body, he roused himself at the pros- 
pect of going home, made the effort, and died. I 
recollect asking him, at one time, what he thought of 
the southern chivalry. His answer had in it food for 
thought, which, though it may be indigestible in these 
lenient times, was the spirit evoked by the barbarous 
usage of prisoners. "I have made up my mind," said 
ho, "to one creed, political and religious, to govern my 



246 THE soldier's story. 

conduct when I get out of prison." " What creed in 
that?" I inquired. "To hate what they love, and love 
what they hate. I shall be sure, then, to be on the 
right side." If the future is to be a repetition of the 
past, I think his creed a safe one for the guidance of 
the North. But let us charitably hope that, now the 
great moral cause of southern inhumanity is removed, 
wrong ideas may also be revolutionized and supplanted 
by new ones. 

At Florence the difficulty of escaping was increased 
by a deep ditch, already described, encircling the entu-e 
prison. This made tunnelling difficult and unprofita- 
ble, as it carried the tunneller, at best, but just beyond 
the stockade, where getting from the ditch would, 
under ordinary circumstances, attract or draw the fire 
of the guard. Yet men got out, by bribing the senti- 
nels, and making their escape, with assistance, over the 
stockade. 

One lucky fellow, who was the possessor of a watch, 
with several others, made his escape in this manner, 
and succeeded in getting into the Federal lines. I af- 
terwards met him at the North, accidentally, on the 
train from New York to Boston, and had from him the 
particulars of his adventures. He and his comrades 
fell in with others who were escaping, formed a party 
estabhshing him as a leader, travelled nights, and slept 
in the woods daytimes. When set upon by dogs, tliey 
killed an entire pack of them, resumed their journey, 
reached the chain of mountains in North Carolina, and 



COINCIDENCES. 247 

travelled on the table-lands of these elevations. At 
two or three diflPerent times they met white men, and, 
knowing it impossible to trust them, — although they, 
in each case, protested that they were Union men, — 
the alternative lay before them of killing them, or 
disposing of them in some manner so as not to endan- 
ger their own safety. Therefore they bucked and 
gagged them securely, and left them in the woods to 
their fate. It was hard that no other course was left 
to them, but desperate men, who had endured prison 
suffering, were in no mood to temporize under such cii - 
cumstances. I wish I remembered and could give this 
man's name, and the full details of his escape, as narrated 
to me. It deserves to be put on record. My meeting 
him, in the manner described, was one of those singular 
coincidences which are stranger than the inventions of 
fiction. Many such coincidences and meetings occurred 
in my prison life. I will instance a few. 

Jesse L., whom I have mentioned in these pages, 
was an old comrade in the engineer corps, in which I 
first enlisted. From the time of my first capture I 
had not seen him until I met him at Andersonville. 
Two men whom I had known at Belle Island very 
intimately, I met again during my second imprison- 
ment. One of them I saw for the first time when we 
embarked on the flag-of-truce boat at Charleston. I 
sat down in the only place I could find, looked around 
at the man next to me, and thought I detected some- 
thing familiar in his face : thinking him one of my 



248 THE soldier's stort. 

casual acquaintances at Florence, I accosted him, when, 
to my surprise, he claimed to be one of my old Belle 
Island associates. At one time, in Florence, a German 
met his brother, whom he had not seen since he left 
home in the old country, some five years before. 

The month of December was cold and gloomy, its 
(ihilly winds wailing through those long, bitter nights, 
like a requiem for the dead. The frost-whitened ground, 
which lay like a shroud over the prison ; the various 
dreadful forms of despair, insanity, disease, and death; 
the shivering, half-clad beings, wandering with plaintive 
moans and chattering teeth up and down the prison, 
impress me now with terror, as one of the darkest 
times of my prison life. I can never think of that time 
without thanking God, with a full heart, for deliver- 
ance. As it is darkest just before dawn of day, so 
there is a gloom of circumstances sometimes preceding 
the light of happier days. 

The rebel adjutant came into camp one day, looking 
up clerks to work upon a register of the prisoners, a 
copy of which was to be sent to our government in 
return for a like compliment conferred by them. I 
wrote my name and detachment, and handed it to the 
officer of the guard. In the afternoon, an ordei'ly came 
into prison, and inquired for me. I accompanied him 
to the colonel's quarters, which was a log house, in 
which were a fire-place and two or three pine tables. 
At one of these sat a youngish, rather under middle 
sized man, dressed in gray. He looked at me with 



RESPECT FOR YANKEEISMS. 249 

surprise, and said, with something of pity in his voice, 
"My poor fellow, can you write?" I took up a pen, 
which lay upon the table, and wrote upon a slip of 
paper a simple sentence, signing my name, rank, &c. 
The colonel drew it towards him, looked it over a 
moment, and said pleasantly, " Very good ; that will 
do. Go into the prison and get your traps, and I will 
set you at work." "I have no traps," said I. "No 
cooking dishes ? " " No ! " It appeared to strike him 
as very strange. "Well," said he, "I'll feed you well 
out here." "I cannot agree to do writing," said I, 
"except for the prison." He looked up as if angry, 
and said, abruptly, "What difference does it make to 
you ? " I said nothing. " Well, well, your Yankeeisms 
shall be respected," said he. 



250 THE soldiee's story. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

A New Life. — Plenty of Food. — Better Clothes and Treatment aa 
a Clerk. — Register of Dead made up for our Government. — 
Large Mortality for the Number of Prisoners. — Many recorded 
" Unknown." — New Supplies of Clotliing. — Colonel Iverson af- 
fected. — Fears from Better Diet. — Symptoms of Paralysis. — A 
large Arrival of Letters. — Longings for Home revived. — Rebel 
Adjutant Cheatham. — Georgia Troops. — Yankees employed- on 
the Register, for Want of Competent Rebels. — General Winder. 

— His Dislike of Favors to Prisoners. — Unfeeling Remarks by 
him. — All sent back to Prison but the Clerks. — Inhumanity to 
Prisoners under him attributed to the Rebel Government. — An 
attempted Palliation by Iverson that Rebel Prisoners were ill 
treated. — Low Estimate of Yankees by Iverson. — Humor of 
Adjutant Cheatham. — His Description of a South Carolina Drill. 

— New Prisoners. — Orders to prepare for Exchange. — A Joyful 
Day. — A Poor Comrade. — Sad Sights. — A little Strategy to get 
off. — A Surprise, and Imprisonment ended. — Left Florence for 
Charleston. — Awaiting the Subsiding of a Storm. — A Massachu- 
setts Rebel. — Compassionate Woman. — Under the "Old Flag" 
again. — Arrival at Annapolis. — Once more at Home. 

SIGNED a parole of honor, agreeing not to go 
beyond prescribed limits without a pass. That 
night I got a glorious supper of fresli beef and white 
bread, of which, however, I did not dare to eat as 
nmch as 1 wished for fear of the consequences. I slept 
in the Adjutant's cabin before a fire, and certainly 
thought myself altogether a lucky fellow. The next 



UNKNOWN DEAD. 251 

morning Adjutant Cheatham, of the fifth Georgia, gave 
me from his wardrobe a shirt and pair of drawers, which 
I considered very clever in one who had so poor a 
supply himself. Said he, apologetically, " I did have 
quite a lot of clothes when I came here, but I gave 
them all away to the bloody Yanks who were running 
around in thar " (pointing to the prison) " like yom*- 
self." I sent my former wardrobe into the prison to 
one of my comrades, and thus disposed of my vennin, 
or most of them. Still I had no shoes, or any other 
articles of clothing, except the said drawers and shirt ; 
but they were woollen and warm, and I tingled all 
over with pleasant sensations from having again a full 
stomach and warm clothes. I went at once to work 
making up a dead register. This register showed, 
when completed, that over seventeen hundred Federal 
soldiers, prisoners of war, had died in tins prison since 
its establishment, the last of September, 1864. The 
prison had never numbered over fifteen thousand men, 
and a good portion of the time five thousand would 
have covered the nmnber contained therein. Many of 
the dead were marked "Unknown." A'NHiat a burden 
of sorrows, disappointed hopes, and miseries were em- 
bodied in that word ! Then- names, their history all 
unknown, uncared-for, they died. Some mother, wife, 
father, or sister mourns them, or vainly waits for theii 
coming. Each sound of footsteps at the door may 
cause their hearts to throb with expectancy ; but no 
more in life shall they behold those faces which once 



252 THE soldier's story. 

gladdened the household. " Sick and in prison," they 
lingered and died, unknown. 

Another lot of goods came from the Sanitary Com- 
mission, via Charleston, for distribution among pris- 
oners during the middle of October. A guard was 
placed over them, and a Federal officer, who by mis- 
take had got into the prison, was taken out and paroled 
for the pui'pose of taking charge of and distributing the 
goods among prisoners. Boxes also came through for 
several prisoners. The instructions were, that all boxes 
were to be examined, to see that they contained nothing 
contraband. The Colonel commanding undertook the 
task. The first box opened had a little pocket Bible, 
and on the fly leaf was -written the name of the pris- 
oner, with the words, "From your mother." As if 
this incident had roused some tender recollections of 
liis own home, the Colonel turned quickly away, saying, 
"Put on the cover again, and let the poor boy have his 
box just as his mother packed it." Of the Sanitary 
goods I got a good suit myself, and had a chance to 
send my drawers and shirt into the prison for friends. 
The Colonel and Adjutant were very jealous of any of 
the paroled men having communication with the other 
prisoners. I had now been out at work on the register 
over a week, getting enough to eat, if I had dared to 
eat it. I had to exercise continual vigilance in regar<3 
to eating, and nothing but the most absolute self-control 
enabled me to keep fi*om eating too much. I had had 
experience of this kind before, when released from Belle 



LETIEES FROM HOME. 253 

Island, which was of great value to me. As it was, I 
scarcely passed a day -without intensely gnping pains 
and vomiting. At this time, too, I began to have my 
first symptoms of paralysis, and often collapsed in a 
heap while walking along, by my legs giving way from 
imder me. 

During my second week on parole, two rebel mail 
agents came to Florence, with about thirty thousand 
letters for the different prisons of the Confederacy. 
As the prisoners had been shifted around so much since 
imprisonment, it was impossible to tell exactly where 
they were. I was set to work to help distribute these 
letters, and look up the names on the register. Often 
the persons would be found to be dead ; whereupon 
Colonel Iverson instructed me to write to their friends, 
informing them of the fact. While thus at work, it 
had never occurred to me that there might be letters 
for myself, until I came upon two. These letters 
informed me that all my friends were well, and though 
they were rather old, they encouraged me, and relieved 
many anxieties. Certainly, thought I, if fortune favors 
in this manner, I shall get out of prison before the war 
is over. Receiving these letters revived passionate 
lonsino's for home and friends, which had been crushed 
for months under the accumulating miseries and mere 
struggle for foothold upon life. 

The office where I wrote and lodged was the quar- 
ters of Lieutenant-Colonel Iverson, which I have once 
described. Paper was a scarce commodity, and we 



254 THE soldier's story. 

were not expected to make a very generous use of it. 
Cheatham, the rebel Adjutant, had before the war been 
a cashier in a bank. He was very kind to liis Yankee 
boys, as he termed us, and was quite an able business 
man. The Adjutant had taken most of. the young boys 
from the prison, and put them in a camp by themselves, 
providing them with much better rations than the stock- 
ade got. In this maimer, about one hundred boys, 
from twelve to fifteen years of age, ^vel•e cared for. 
He had one or two fine-looking little feUows around 
the office, whom he made great pets of. The Adjutant 
was very droll and humorous sometimes, and Avas never 
so happy as when he could get Eddy Kuapp and another 
Yankee boy at dancing, or singing negro and comic 
songs. He used gravely to tell the women down in 
the village that these boys were Yankee girls, and at 
one time so completely humbugged them into the belief, 
that, prompted by curiosity, these Secesh dames one 
day made a visit to the prison headquarters, and com- 
menced quizzing the Adjutant about his supposed girls, 
when the Adjutant, who had instructed the boys Avhat to 
say, had their hair parted in the middle, and introduced 
them at the headquarters. The women asked them, 
"Be you Yankee gu-ls?" "Yes, ma'am," was the 
answer. "Where do you stop o' nights?" " O, right 
in here with the Adjutant." Whereupon each Secesh 
dame took her snuff stick, which she had sat chewing, 
from her mouth, and sat in blank amazement, and 
when the Adjutant was out, said among themselves, 



" EEBEL INCOMPETENCY. 255 

' This Cheatum is a drefful man." These women after- 
wards wished to look over the stockade at the prisoners, 
and were so lost to all Christian feeling and decency as to 
say, as they saw the emaciated creatures of the prison, 
" Goo^ enough for them Yanks ; they needn't have cum'd 
down to fight we'uns." Cheatham was a humane fellow, 
generous in his impulses, yet a rebel of tlie darkest dye, 
for all tliat. " Gol ding it," he used to say, " the Yanks 
have got a powerful spite 'gainst us, and we have got 
everything 'gainst them, and the best way is to fight 
until it's knocked out of each other." 

I often had a chance of seeLng: the "five Greorgia" 
and other rebel regiments in line. Their dress was a 
medley of all the dry goods of the Confederacy, and 
their drill in the manual of arms embraced every de- 
scription of infantry tactics, from Scott to Hardee. 
Some of the rebel privates one day passed headquarters, 
and said one to the other, "Good quarters, arn't they, i 
Jim?" "Yes," responded Jim, "and full of them 
devilish Yanks." The Adjutant heard the remark, and 
turned to me, and said, "You see how jealous our folks 
are when we do any kindness for you Yankees." I 
have no doubt that the Colonel and Adjutant had to put 
up with many caustic remarks from rebel soldiers and 
citizens, whenever it was known they showed mercy 
or favor to the starving, dying thousands under their 
charge. " To tell the truth," said Cheatham, " I wouldn't 
have one of you Yanks to work on that register, but 
my rebs have no tact for business. They can fight like 



256 THE soldier's story. 

the devil, but don't take to reading or writing, or such 
things." This was a tacit acknowledgment of the 
superiority of the Yankees in point of intelligence. It 
was full as rare to see a Yankee private who could not 
write, as it was to see a rebel who could. 

l\niile distributing the mail, of which I have spoken, 
the rebel general, Winder, made his appearance at the 
prison. He was a man apparently about sixty years 
of age, dressed in homespun Secesh citizen clothes, 
butternut-coat and gray pants, tall, spare, and straight 
in figure, with an austere expression of face, a firm, 
set mouth, a large Roman nose, like a pan'ot's beak, and 
a cold, stony, stern eye. I overheard a conversation, 
which took place on the morning of his arrival, between 
him and Colonel Iverson, who stood just under the 
cabin window, near where I was writing. Said Win- 
der, in sharp, abrupt tones, "Colonel Iverson, I can't 
have all these Yankees running around outside the 
prison. What are they doing ? " The Colonel explained 
that it was necessary, in order to provide tlie prison 
with wood, and to erect shelter for the sick. "No 
necessity," said Winder, abruptly ; to which Ivei-son 
responded in a tone of remonstrance and entreaty, 
"General, the prisoners, in spite of all I have done, or 
can do, are starving." " Let them stai*ve then ! " said 
Winder, in sharp, angry tones, putting a stop to further 
conversation. In about an hour afterwards, Iverson 
came in with a pale, anxious, troubled look upon his 
handsome features-, and walking nervously back and 



INHUMANITY OF GENERAI. WESTDER. 257 

forth m the office, gave the Adjutant instructions to 
write the order sending back all paroled men except 
those at work in the office, and a few others, to the 
prison. 

I mention this incident, as I think it furnishes the key- 
to the general inhumanity with which prisoners were 
uniformly treated in all the rebel prisons. First, 
public sentiment South forbade to prisoners civilized 
usage ; second, the inflexible Winder was in general 
command of all the Confederate prisons, and received 
orders direct from the chief actors in the rebellion. 
Winder afterwards died of disease contracted at Flor- 
ence military prison, and thus poetical justice was 
dealt out. Mr. Christian, the rebel mail agent, related 
to me an instance of General Winder's severity and 
moroseness of temper. " In some battle around Rich- 
mond, a Brigadier-General was captured with other 
prisoners. Winder stood giving orders for the disposal 
of the prisoners. The Brigadier-General, in fawning 
tones, said, " Ah, General, what are you going to do with 
me?" Winder turned abruptly on his heels, replying in 
his sharpest tones, "Hang you, sir." 

Several times I had conversations with Iverson and the 
Adjutant in relation to the treatment of prisoners, and 
in regard to slavery, in which my natural hastiness often 
got the better of my caution, and I expressed myself 
pretty freely. The Colonel defended the use of a dead- 
line, saying it was copied from our prison regulations, 
and very gravely stated that the Federal treatment of 
17 



258 THE soldier's story. 

rebel prisoners was as bad as theirs. " The treatment,' 
said he, "on both sides is cruel." He instanced tht 
treatment of prisoners at Fort Delaware, and said some 
of the boys of his regiment had been there, and that 
they did not get enough to eat, though he admitted it 
was through the rascality of the officers in charge of 
the distribution of rations. "They had tents," said 1. 
" Yes," said he, angrily, " but we don't have any for our 
own men," and closed the conversation by going out. 
Some of my comrades, engaged in writing on the 
register with me, said, " Sarge, the Colonel has got his 
mad up, and you'll be sent into the stockade." Iverson 
stood only just outside, overheard the remark, and 
coming in at the door, indirectly reproved the speaker, 
by coldly saying, " I never think less of a man who has 
convictions which are not changed by his circumstances. 
I can trust such men." There were no men among the 
prisoners whom the Colonel had such contempt for as 
the " Galvanized Yanks." He treated men with severity 
when they intimated that they w ished to . " take the 
oath." He would say roughly to them, " You are 
traitors on one side — you will turn traitors to us the 
first chance you get ; I can't endure a man who does not 
fight from principle." To Union men, who belonged 
to southern states, he was very vindictive and harsh, 
often calling them d — d traitors, asking them some- 
times what they were fighting against their country 
for? 

The Colonel's estimate of Yankee integrity and 



Cheatham's esteviate of y^lnkees. 259 

intellect was a very low one. He was very much 
prejudiced against them, and refused to see that the 
general physical and mental condition of the prisoners 
was owing to long suffering. He would sometimes 
say in my hearing, of some poor creature who had 
had all his humanity starved out of him, "Now, look 
at him ; he don't know so much as one of our niggers." 
I once overheard a conversation between him and a 
citizen. "These Yanks," said he, pointing to a squad 
of prisoners, "are just like our niggers ; you can't trust 
most of them out of sight." Noticing that I heard 
him, with true gentlemanly instinct, he stopped in his 
remarks. When I got a little ahead of him in any 
remark, he would say, " Sergeant, you are the dog- 
gondest stubborn Yank I have got," or, "You are a 
heavy dog," and then closed the conversation by walk- 
ing off. 

Adjutant Cheatham used to delight in telling humor- 
ous incidents, and would even mimic his favorite rebels 
in all their grotesqueness. Unlike most rebels, he was 
free from the negro accent or patois, but would assume 
it with great drollery when he was mimicking the 
" South Caroleneans." I will not vouch for the truth 
of the following incident, which he used to relate in a 
manner which would have made a mule laugh. "I 
was out the other morning," said he, "and saw a guard 
drill that knocked all my ideas of that performance. 
Groups of men were standing around their huge fires — 
the mornings were quite cold — when one of the 



260 THE soldier's story. 

South Carolinian officers came up, and pushing away a 
big fat fellow who had tied a tarred rope into his belt to 
make it reach round him, said, ' Eph, git from afore 
me, for I'm a-cold,' and proceeded to warm his rear by 
elevating his coat tail on his hands. Then looking 
around upon the group, he said, ' Now, boys, git into 
two ranks like tater ridges, for I'se a goin tu fling yer 
into fours.' After getting them into two ranks, he 
gave the order to ' right dress ; ' but the line didn't suit 
him. Eph, especially, gave him trouble. ' Eph, Eph, 
stick yer stomach in thar.' This Eph endeavored to 
do ; but when his feet were in line his stomach pro- 
truded way beyond, and when his stomach was in line 
his feet were in the rear rank. Getting vexed at this, 
he pulled out his sword, and drew a crooked mark 
in front of the company, saying, ' Gol ding it, if yer 
can't right dress, come up ter that scratch.' They did 
this very satisfactorily, when he commenced to drill 
them. The first order was, 'Two ranks inter four 
ranks, double smart, right quick, git ! ' But in this 
manoeuvre they got mixed up so bad that it wasn't 
tried again. He then commenced to drill them in the 
manual of arms. The person addressed as Eph 
seemed to take unkindly to this military drill, and his 
Captain addressed him in pathetic tones of remon- 
strance : ' Eph ! Eph ! I've told yer four times to bring 
that gun ter a tote, and yer hain't done it. Eph, yer 
have acted the plum fool ! ' Addressing the Sergeant 
of the relief, he said, ' Put this 'er Eph on guard near 



PREPARATIONS FOR PAROLE. 261 

the swamp, where Cheatum won't see him.' And," 
said Cheatham, " without seeing me, away went the 
relief at route step, with arms in all positions but the 
right ones." 

, During the second week out on parole, about thirty 
men belonging to one of our merchantmen, captured 
just off New York harbor by a rebel cruiser, were 
brought into the prison. Iverson paroled the officers, 
but turned the common sailors into the prison to take 
their luck with the prisoners. The officers, who had 
enough to eat and good clothes, thought outside life 
about the hardest of anything they ever heard of, and 
were much surprised when I told them I thought they 
ought not to grumble, when men inside the stockade 
were starving. Two officers. Lieutenant Luke and 
Lieutenant J. Laughlin, were captured while trying to 
escape from Columbia, and brought into Florence 
prison about this time. Lieutenant Laughlin was 
captured in the same battle with myself, and as I was 
personally acquainted with him, I slyly gave him 
clothes, and went to the Colonel, at risk of being sent 
into the stockade again, and interceded for good 
quarters and food for them, which were given. 

The last of November, orders came from General 
Hardee to commence making out parole rolls for the 
sick and wounded prisoners at Florence, who were to 
be sent to Charleston, at the rate of two thousand 
every other day. I, with others, went to work upon 
these paroles. What a joyful day it was to those men 



262 THE soldier's story. 

as at last they realized that they were going home, 
and with trembling, eager hands they signed their 
parole of freedom ! I was at work making out these 
parole rolls, when a poor creature came Avith tottering 
steps to the table, and tried to sign his name. " You'll 
haxe to write my name," said he ; "I'm not the man I 
was when you and I were captured at Plymouth." I 
looked up and recognized in this shattered wreck of 
humanity a Sergeant who belonged to Company G, 
second Massachusetts heavy artillery. I left my writ- 
ing to another clerk, while I helped the poor fellow to 
my log hut, and gave him warm drink and food, and 
my blanket to lie on. The poor fellow tried to thank 
me, but broke down, crying like a child. He was not 
very coherent in his speech. He could only say 
repeatedly, " Do you think we're going home ? " I as- 
sured him of the fact, and left him to resume my 
duties. Afterwards, when I returned, he was gone. 
He must have died on the way to Charleston, as I 
could never ascertain that he reached his home. 

Day after day I wrote on the parole rolls, trying 
to see my way clear to get away with the sick and 
wounded. Men were hourly dying before headquarters. 
Mr. Christian, the rebel mail agent, repeatedly said, as 
he saw the poor fellows come out, feebly trying to 
cheer, that it was the saddest sight he ever beheld. I 
was instrumental in getting several of my comrades out 
of prison on the parole list, and finally summoned 
courage to make application in my own behalf, 



STRATEGY TO LEAVE THE PEISON. 263 

when I was told to be contented or go back to the 
stockade. 

After quite a delay in transportation, an order came 
from General Hardee, to have fifteen hundred prisoners 
ready for transportation on the afternoon of the next 
day. The names were placed on rolls, giving rank, 
regiment, and company, after which the prisoners 
signed their names, or made their marks. These rolls 
were in triplicate, and each roll contained, I believe, 
about three hundred names. Like our army rolls, no 
erasures were allowed. When the order came I asked 
the Adjutant if I could put my name down on the rolls. 
He turned away, muttering something, and I pro- 
ceeded to put my name down among the paroled. I 
then made out triplicates for the rolls, containing about 
three hundred names each, and anxiously awaited re- 
sults. An officer commenced calling the rolls, each 
man stepping out into line as the names were called. 
The decisive moment at length arrived. My name was 
called. I laid down my pen, took my hat and stood in 
line. " Here ! here ! " exclaimed both the Adjutant and 
Colonel, in chorus, " what does this mean ? " "I thought 
you told me," said I, with feigned surprise, " that I 
could go home with this squad. Adjutant." The Adju- 
tant laughed, the Colonel looked pleasant, and I took 
courage. "Well," said Colonel Iverson, after a pause, 
" you can go ; but you must confess that it is a d — ^d 
Yankee trick." When at last I left, on my way to the 
cars, the Adjutant said, "I'm glad for you; I intended 



264 THE soldier's story. 

you to go soon. I expect next you will be telling the 
Yankees what a d — d rascal Adjutant Cheatham was." 
And here I am telling all about him. 

I left Florence that night. We were stowed on top 
and inside box cars. We travelled all next day, and 
arrived in Charleston about twelve o'clock next night. 
It blew hard, and was bitterly cold, when we were 
ordered off the cars, and had rations of hard-tack 
given out to us. Prisoners here and there lay 
dead and dying. It seemed too sad, when so near the 
promised lar 1, that they should die. It was very cold 
the next morning, when we were on our march to the 
flag-of-truce boat ; but what did we care for that ? 
Were we not going home once more to see friends, and 
the dear old flag we had so often fought under, and 
which, God willing, we would fight under again? 
The wind was too heavy for the flag-of-truce boat 
to go, and reluctantly we were obliged to leave her ; 
and from thence we were marched to Roper Hospital. 
From here, however, we were sent to the workhouse 
yard, which I have described in preceding pages. For 
two days we waited here, losing courage. Many lost 
hope, and many lay dead and dying around us. 

The rebel commissary came in the evening to the 
workhouse yard. I inquired of him when we should 
be sent to our transports. His answer was encour- 
aging ; and in course of conversation he asked me 
where I belonged. I answered, " Massachusetts." " So 
do I," said he, extending his hand; "I belong to 



AWAITING PASSAGE HOME. 265 

Massachusetts." I inquired what part. "Marion," 
was the reply. I was acquainted there, and soon 
found I knew several of his friends. He took me 
and several friends out with him, and gave us quarters 
in Roper Hospital, which were very good. While at 
this hospital I came u^jon some letters. One of them 
was addressed to the board of physicians in charge, 
asking what disposal was to be made of the hospital 
if the city fell into Federal hands. This letter was 
dated just at the time of our first attack on Charleston, 
and shows that the rebels were not so confident at that 
time of withstanding the assault as they afterwards were. 

We had been in Charleston three days, anxiously 
waiting, when the fog, which had been very dense, 
cleared away, and orders for our removal, together 
with ambulances, came to the hospital to move the 
sick to the flag-of-truce boat. Those not able to walk 
were brought out and laid on the sidewalk, where some 
of the poor fellows died. Peter Jones, one of my 
company, died thus. "It is hard," said he, sorrowfully. 
They were the last words he uttered. 

While these men lay gasping on the sidewalk, a 
woman came to the red-headed surgeon, who superin- 
tended their removal, and asked permission to give the 
poor sick fellows some soup she had for them. He 
rebuked her severely, saying, "If you have any such 
thing to give away, give it to our boys, down on the 
Island. You show," said he, "what side you are on." 
Her reply was, " Any tiling for humanity's sake, doctor; 



266 THE soldier's story. 

let me give these poor men something to eat." While 
she was thus occupying the attention of this Con- 
federate ogre, she had sent some children around on 
the flank, who provided the sick with soup and gruel. 
The surgeon raved when he found himself outflanked 
and outwitted by a woman. 

About three o'clock that afternoon, we were again on 
the wharf, near the flag-of-truce boat. What a joyful 
moment ! yet it seemed too good to be true. We, who 
had been so used to being deceived, were incredulous 
to the last moment. As we stood on the wharf, the 
commissary whom I have mentioned came up to me, 
and, shaking hands, said in a tremulous undertone, "I'd 
give anything to be in your place, going to Massa- 
chusetts." Dear, proud old Massachusetts ! thy chil- 
dren can never, wherever their footsteps wander, forget 
thee ! At last we sailed down the harbor — were in 
sicrht of our dear old flaof — at last were lashed to our 
receiving ship, were on board, and, thank God for his 
mercy, were again under the old flag. How our tear- 
dimmed eyes gazed at its folds, and we, with solemn, 
sobbing voices, said, " Thank God ! thank God ! " The 
link that bound us to the terrible past was broken ; 
the gaunt forms, the famine-stricken faces of those who 
survived, and the torturing memories they will ever 
have of those dark days of death and despair, attest 
how cruel and merciless were those who had charge of 
rebel prisons. 

I arrived at Annapolis on the 16th of December, 



AT HOIVIE AGAIN. 267 

1864, and was soon at home among friends, ^/here, 
vipon my arrival, I was attacked with typhus fever, 
and the only sight I could bear upon the walls of my 
sick room during my delirium, was that emblem of our 
country's honor and glory, the Stars and Stripe?. To- 
day, though broken in health, and perhaps crippled for 
life, I record these sufferings as a remembrance to 
coming generations, and dedicate these pages io the 
memory of the living and the dead, who in the " great 
struggle" have suffered or died in prisons, and upon 
well-fought battle-fields, for our country's preservation 
and honor. 



APPEl^DIX. 



oN<c 



" We, the undersigned, having been informed that Mr. 
Warren Lee Goss has written a book narrating his expe- 
rience and observations in rebel prisons during the late 
civil war, which work may contain statements not readily 
accepted by some persons as true, desire unhesitatingly 
to testify that, fi'om long personal acquaintance, we know 
him to be a gentleman of undoubted veracity and unques- 
tionable integrity. 

I. W. Richardson, 68 Cornhill, Boston, Attorney at Law. 
I. N. Richardson, " " " 

R. I. Attwill, Boston Daily Commercial. 
C. B. Wood, Town Clerk and Treasurer of Middleboro'. 
S. B. Pratt, Editor and Proprietor Middleboro' Gazette. 
W. H. Wood, Judge of Probate Plymouth County. 
L. A. Abbott, Pastor of Baptist Church, Middleboro'. 
S. B. Phinney, Editor and Proprietc^r Barnstable Patriot 
and Collector of Port of Barnstable." 



(269) 



270 APPENDIX. 

The following is from sur\dviiig comrades : — 

" We, the undersigned, prisoners at Andersonville and 
other rebel prisons with Warren Lee Goss in 1864, take 
pleasure in bearing testimony to his unimpeachable truth- 
fulness as a man, and to his honor and bravery as a 
soldier. In hours of sorest trial in those dreadful prisons 
(the hori'ors of which have been but one half told), when 
all finer sensibilities were pinched out of most of the men 
by hunger, sickness, and dread, he was ever a kind, patient, 
and faithful friend. Though suffering himself the common 
lot of hunger, exposure, and torture, he ever found time 
to comfort the sick and soothe the dying. When others 
sank, their hearts appalled by the prospects before and 
around them, his unfaltering courage upheld and cheered 
them. We are sincerely gratified at this opportunity of 
expressing our appreciation of his merits, and are pleased 
that so worthy a comrade and so kind a friend has taken 
upon himself the task of giving to the Avorld an account 
of those days of suffering, despair, and death, when the 
strongest hearts were appalled with terror, and found hope 
and refuge only with God. 

Residence. 

S. J. Evans, Sergt. Co. H., 2d Mass. H. A., Providence, R. I. 
G. T. Whitcomb, " " N. Bridgewater, Mass. 

S. F. Sullivan, '^ " Lynn, " 

S. T. Meara, "> " Salem, « 

J. W. Damon, '^ " Boston, " 

W. S. Oakman, " " Charlestown," 

J. T. McGinnis, 1st Sergt. Co. C, 5th U.S.Vols., Boston." 



APPENDIX. 27 i 

" The following is from the descriptive rolls of "Warren 
Lee Goss, Acting Sergeant-Major Battalion, Second Massa- 
chusetts Heavy Artillery, on file at Washington : — 

"'Warren Lee Goss was a prisoner at Andersonville, 
Georgia, Charleston and Florence, South Carolina, and 
other rebel prisons. During the action at Plymouth (where 
captured) he behaved with great bravery.' 

(Signed) " O M. Fish, 1st Lieut. Co. H., 

2d Mass. H. A., Commanding Company." 



In the city of Washington at the time of the Wirz 
trial, there being survivors of Andersonville Prison 
present from all parts of the country, an organization 
was formed called the " Andersonville Survivors' Asso- 
ciation." The following letter is from the President of 
that body : — 

" I am glad some one has at last undertaken the task 
of writing an account of life in rebel prisons. I am sure 
you are acquainted (to your sorrow) with all the minutias 
of the subject. I am especially gratified that an old com- 
rade, whom I have always found of unflinching integrity 
in all the trials of a soldier's life, — one who enjoyed the 
confidence of his officers, and esteem and love of comrades, 
— should assume a task like this. All returned soldiers who 
were acquainted with you testify to your kindness, bravery, 
and faithful friendship in those scenes of horror which were 
the accompaniments of prison life. 

" Patrick Bradly, 
" President Andersonville Survivors' Association. 

"MiLFORD, December 17, 1866.' 



272 APPENDIX. 

The physician who attended the author after his 
arrival from prison, testifies to his physical condition 
as follows : — 

" Immediately after the arrival of Warren Lee Goss 
from rebel prisons, T was called to see him professionally, 
and found him completely prostrated, suffering from scurvy, 
chronic diarrhoea, and cerebrous typhus fever, all of which 
were, beyond doubt, the effects of privations and inhuman 
treatment while incarcerated in those loathsome prisons ; 
as also paralysis of the limbs, from which he lias not as 
yet recovered. 

"William P. Cross, M. D. 

" Boston, December 18, 1866." 



" 1 have had an acquaintance for several years with 
Mr. Warren Lee Goss, and cheerfully testify that I know 
him to be a gentleman of stei'ling integrity and worth. 
During the war he has performed good and patriotic ser- 
vices for the country. 

" Last winter he delivered in this county lectures of 
unusual interest, giving details of his experience in the 
army, for which he received the thanks of our people. 

" S. B. Phinney, 
" Editor and Proprietor Barnstable Patriot. 

"Baenstable, December 1, 1806." 



Colonel Archibald Bogle, Thirty-fifth United States 
Colored Troops, sends the publishers the following: — 



\PPENDIX. 273 

" Melrose, December 27, 1866." 
" Messrs. Lee and Shepard, 

" Publishers, Boston. 
"Gentlemen, — I have read over one hundred of the 
proof pages of a book written by Warren Lee Goss, Esq., 
entitled ' The Soldier«6 Story of Captivity.' I have pe- 
culiar pleasure in saying I formed an acquaintance with 
the author at Andersonville in 1864. I am but too familiar 
with many of the scenes which he depicts, and unhesi- 
tatingly testify that, so far as I have read, his descriptions 
of scenes of prison life are written with rare fidelity to 
truth, without exaggeration, and with a candor and straight- 
forwardness which I am sure cannot fail to meet the warm 
appreciation of those who survived the terrors of that 
prison, and claim the highest consideration of every reader. 
As such I commend it. 

" I am, gentlemen, 

" Very respectfully, 

"Archibald Bogle." 



We, the undersigned, who were companions or acquaint- 
ances of Warren Lee Goss at Andersonville and other rebel 
prisons, having read the book written by him, entitled " The 
Soldier's Story of his Captivity at Andersonville, Belle Isle, 
and other Rebel Prisons," certify to the general truthfulness 
of the work, and also to many of the particular incidents 
narrated. Some of the scenes depicted, which did not come 
under our immediate notice, we know to have been of very 
frequent occurrence. The picture is in no respect overdrawn ; 
on the contrary, language would fail to convey to the reader 



274 APPENDIX. 

a just appreciation of the terrible agony suffered, and the 
appalling scenes constantly witnessed by us. 

Arch. Bogle, late Col. 35th U. S. C. T., Melrose, Mass. 

Edward F. Campbell, late 2d Lieut. 2d Mass. Heavy 
Artil., Cambridge, Mass. 

S. J. Evans, late Qr. Master Sfergt. 2d Mass. Heavy 
Artil., Providence, R. I. 

Arthur H. Smith, late 1st Sergt. 2d Mass. Heavy 
Artil., Chicopee, Mass. 

John F. McGinnis, late 1st Sergt. 5th U. S. Vol. Inf., 
Boston, Mass. 

Pierce Penderghast, late 1st Sergt. 5th U. S. Vol. 
Inf., Boston, Mass. 

S. T. Meara, late Sergt. 2d Mass. H.Art., Salem, Mass. 

William H. Shirley, late Sergt. 1st Mass. Heavy Ar- 
til., Salem, Mass. 

S. F. Sullivan, late Sergt. 2d Mass. H. Art., Lynn, Mass. 

J. W. Damon, late Sergt. 2d Mass. H. A., Boston, Mass. 

C. F. Riley, late Sergt. 2d Mass. Heavy Artil., Ran- 
dolph, Mass. 

GrEORGE T. Whitcomb, late Corp. 2d Mass. Heavy 
Artil., North Bridgewater, Mass. 

Thos. H. Mann, late Cp.l8th Mass. Vol. Inf., Ionia,Mich. 

P. Daley, late of 2d Mass. H.A., Milford, Mass. 

P. FiTZSiMMONS, late of 2d Mass. H. A., Milford, Mass. 

Mich. Conniffe, late of 2d Mass. H. A., Milford, Mass. 

Peter Prew, late of 2d Mass. H. Artil., Milford, Mass. 

Wm. Smith, late of 12th Mass. Vol. Inf., Milford, Mass. 

Patrick Bradley, late of 2d Mass. II. A., Milford, Mass. 

Dexter D. Keith, late of 2d Mass. H. A., Randolph, 
Mass. 






^ 



Ill 



